In his first foray into the book business in 2003, Sean Neville applied the Netflix model to audio rental and cofounded Simply Audiobooks, which he sold last year. Now he’s moving into traditional bookselling with last week’s purchase of niche business bookstore, Books for Business, in downtown Toronto, the large dedicated business bookstore, founded two decades ago by Jane Cooney.
“I am delighted to acquire this important resource to the business community, and I am looking forward to taking the company to the next level,” says Neville, who reached out earlier this year to Cooney, whom he met when SAB bought Spoken Words bookstore nearby. “I like to do businesses of things I enjoy,” he adds. For example, he got into the audio bookstore business after getting frustrated at having to spend $40 to buy the audio of Good to Great, which he only wanted to listen to once.
Fortunately, Neville is an entrepreneur who enjoys a challenge: in this case leveraging the brand of a 2,000 sq. ft. store, which does most of its business through store front. “The growth of the business has to be beyond that footprint. How do we brand ourselves as a premier niche bookstore and get books to as many people as far away as possible?,” says Neville, who is looking to stores like Powell’s, the Strand, and Tattered Cover for answers. To broaden the store’s reach, but stay within the business book niche, he’s planning to bring his technological know-how from SAB to upgrade the BooksforBusiness.com site. But Neville faces yet another challenge, merging Books for Business and its sister company, Britnell Book Wholesalers, which has operated as a separate business since its purchase in 1999.
For her part 67-year-old Cooney is very pleased. After working full-time for the past 46 years, she’s looking forward to retiring at the end of December. She will stay on as a director of the company. “We’ve had a lot of tire-kickers over the years,” says Cooney, “and we couldn’t be more delighted. I’m very, very confident we’re leaving it in good hands.”
