Sadness and anger after Bertrams goes into administration

Industry figures have spoken of their sadness at Bertrams' fall into administration on Friday (19th June), as well as anger over unpaid bills and unreturned stock.

Turpin Baker Armstrong has taken over administration of the Norwich wholesaler's business, with company-wide redundancies for staff and an auction of assets including nearly 300,000 books planned for 1st July.

Will Atkinson, m.d. at Atlantic, said: “My heart goes out to the very many people who have lost their jobs. Bertrams have been at the heart of the UK book industry for over 50 years, so seeing it go from a strong family business through various ownerships and now into administration is desperately sad." He added: "Gardners is family-owned. Go figure.”

David Prescott, c.e.o of Blackwells, said it would be useful to have an alternative player in the market, despite the "supportive" role Gardners plays. “It’s obviously a shame that Bertrams has finally gone into administration, particularly for those directly affected," he said. "As booksellers it is always helpful to have a range of sourcing options so hopefully it might be an opportunity for others to step into that the space that has been vacated,” he added.

Juliet Mabey, publisher at Oneworld, said: “Like most publishers, and many independent booksellers, we are incredibly disappointed a buyer has not come forward to take on Bertrams, partly because we are owed a considerable sum of money that we had hoped a new buyer might eventually repay, but also because it provides healthy competition to have more than one wholesaler in our market."

Richard Drake, of Drake the Bookshop, said he had rarely used Bertrams but that he hoped its demise would not have an adverse knock-on effect on Gardners. “Hopefully the extra trade that Gardners will now inevitably do will not diminish the excellent service and support we have had from them since our opening, which we have been reassured over,” he said.

Some publishers have been angered by the lack of transparency in the months leading up Bertrams administration, with reports of unpaid debts and unanswered emails reaching back to December 2019. Others are owed in excess of £15,000. There is concern that Betrams' book inventory will not find its way back to the publishers, as it has been advertised for auction along with the warehouse and packing equipment.

Donna Ravenhill of Dandy Booksellers said publishers should be allowed to retrieve the stock and sell the books direct to the customers. “That would be the decent thing for them to do,” she said. “We should band together and get the standing orders list, and do it ourselves.”

Mark Neeter, c.e.o. of Red Planet, said Bertrams had behaved "appallingly".

"They have been slow and late on paying for the last 12 months plus," he said. "They only went into administration today (19th June) but have been hiding behind the administrators for months now. They have refused to answer a lot of people’s phone calls, emails or any other communication for months. It’s been the worst experience of many people’s lives. They’ve taken us for £3,500, which in the scheme of things isn’t crazy, but it’s still books they should have paid for."

He added: "Because their owner Aurelius has a debenture, there’s no way any of us will get the money, they will get the money."