The future of bookshops is bright for next 10 years

“The future of bookshops is bright for next 10 years”
Apr 19th, 2010 | By All About Book Publishing | Category: Book Shops

says Indresh Sachdeva of Indra Book Depot, Roorkee (Uttrakhand)
in conversation with Varsha Verma.
Tilak Raj Sachdeva, Indresh and his uncle.

Tilak Raj Sachdeva, Indresh and his uncle.

Indra Book Depot is a 22-year-old bookshop catering to the students in and around the city of Roorkee. This city is located on the banks of the Ganga canal on the National highway between Delhi and Dehradun and is better known for the IIT College (formerly Roorkee University). With so many elite students in this small city, the need for good quality books is understandable and Indra Book Depot has been serving the students for over two decades.
Established in 1988 by Tilak Raj Sachdeva as the one stop shop for all technical books for B.Tech and I.T. and reference books, Indra Book Depot has come a long way. From father to son, the business became a family business and his sons Hitesh and Indresh joined it, at a tender age. “Infact, I and my brother Hitesh joined my father when we were in sixth standard. I went on to pursue my M.Com., all the while taking care of the shop as well. We all worked together for some ten years and then Hitesh took up a different business and I continued working with my dad,” shared Indresh.
“Anticipating the change in reading habits, we diversified into general books like self-help books, personality development, etc. Then, we also started selling competitive books for AIEEE, IIT, etc,” told Indresh. “And the books on English communication are very much in demand, the best of them being ‘Word Power Made Easy.’”
So what have been the trends in this business? “Earlier, there were limited readers and limited publishers. We used to stock more of foreign books but now we have a major chunk of Indian books as well. Last five years has been an upsurge in the number of private colleges, which has increased the demand for technical books. Besides, a lot of local authors are there to cater to the needs of the syllabus based books for schools and colleges. So, we have a lot of books on each and every topic. Ofcourse, just thirty to forty percent of local authors are competent but still, they give good competition to their counterparts,” he replied.
Sharing his views on the impact of ebooks on traditional books, Indresh said that ebooks will not change the demand for traditional books majorly. “Earlier, it was predicted that CDs would take over the books but gradually, they became a part of the books. Similarly, I don’t think ebooks will take over the traditional books.” In a city like Roorkee, has he mulled over the prospect of setting up a bookshop cum café for readers? “Yes, we had few offers as well from some colleges, and we may come up with that set-up in future. But we are still not sure if this kind of concept would sell in Roorkee,” he added.
“The future of book shops seems bright for atleast the next 10 years or so and with many colleges coming up, the demand would substantially increase in near future. Ofcourse, the discounts are more now but when we talk in volumes, the returns are not bad,” concluded Indresh.