The Cultural and Community Role of Scotland's Bookshops

We are incredibly pleased to bring you a report on the cultural and community role of Scotland’s bookshops, commissioned to ensure booksellers' roles are known, celebrated and supported.   The report, authored for us by Howard Davies, is a massive testament to the cultural role and value of all bookshops across Scotland.

You can read the report in English here and in Gaelic here.

Published to coincide with Scottish BookTrust’s annual Book Week Scotland, the report spotlights the vital and growing role Scottish bookshops play as engines of local communities and national culture, and draws on survey data and in-depth interviews from Scottish booksellers of all sizes. It outlines how Scottish bookshops foster children’s literacy, promote small presses and homegrown authors, bring communities together, partner with arts groups and festivals, support charities and libraries, and champion Scots and Gaelic languages. The overarching aim of the report is to illustrate and quantify how Scottish bookshops contribute far beyond retail, serving as community hubs and cultural beacons whose impact is profound, far-reaching, and growing.  The research also highlights bookshops’ roles in supporting schools to boost children’s reading for pleasure – now more important than ever.

The report also identifies barriers that risk undermining this work and growth – including limited funding, high operating costs, and structural pressures on high streets - and offers clear recommendations to safeguard and strengthen the dynamic Scottish bookshop sector, including the potential for culture vouchers for 16-year-olds, funding for school author visits, reforms to non-domestic rates, and stronger partnerships with arts and literacy organisations.

At a time when bringing communities together and celebrating national culture is more important than ever, it is vital that we support and protect those who work tirelessly in facilitating this. Scottish bookshops are unsung heroes, going above and beyond to deliver far more than selling books and are deeply deserving of wider recognition, tangible support, and ongoing investment to allow them to deliver for years to come.

Please find here a range of social media assets for you  to use, also posted @booksellersassociation on Instagram.

If you have any questions about the report, please contact [email protected] – please feel free to use it in your local advocacy work, and with your suppliers and partners.

We are thrilled that the report has already seen takeup in The Herald, The Scotsman, The Times and more, alongside local press. If you would like to cover any aspects of the report in the media, please contact [email protected] 

Please find the press release here.
 
We are incredibly proud of our booksellers and how they emerge from this comprehensive report.  Thank you all for taking part in the survey to help us create it in the first place.