How to sell rare books
How to make MILLIONS selling Rare Books.
0:00 / 0:00
Timecodes:
I don't know that I've ever told you
Simon how I got started no I'd love to
know it's always
exciting to find out how people get this
bug and get hooked on the game because I
know we were talking outside earlier
that you never have to retire from what
we're doing no but if I go back 37 years
when I got out of college my family had
a small bookstore in Dallas okay and but
the business family business was an
insurance agency okay
I changed Majors multiple times in
college I couldn't figure out what I
wanted to do I so I go back and get
involved in the family business which
has a small Bookstore over in the corner
which is kind of like a service to the
community well
it didn't take me long to discover I
dislike selling insurance
but I enjoy talking to people about
books yeah and so we only had 10
customers a day so if somebody came in I
would get up from my insurance desk and
go talk to them and this is mid 80s and
invariably they would ask for a book
that was out of print and I would write
it down on an index card and go try to
find them and that was a whole different
game back then finding books without
them really a different different game
yeah you relied on just going to
bookstores to find them locally or
sending letters off to other cities and
that could take weeks to to get an
answer but that was the beginnings
um and I dabbled with the bookstore for
about a year and I told my dad I would
really like to do this and he says you
can never make a living selling books
we've had this bookstore for 10 years I
can't even pay the bills
and I said okay another year went by and
I could see that just these Innovations
of adding used books
totally made a difference and after two
years after college I said I'm going to
do books full time and so I hired my
best customer a young woman who was in
the bookstore frequently
we got a toll-free number a direct we
started doing Direct Mail started doing
used books and it just kind of took off
in the early days my budget was five
dollars ten dollars and that's what I
would stick to but over time it's gone
to a much higher level
in 2005 though I could see the writing
on the wall with Amazon Kindle eBooks
digital everything it was destroying new
books and so I made the decision to
break out of new books and focus on use
more towards rare books and
that's kind of how I got here the big
transition though was about 15 years ago
so the first 20 years it's new and used
but that got my feet wet that helped me
understand understand how everything was
working and
with the admin of the internet that
didn't replace all of the
people that I'd met and connections
because most good Acquisitions you don't
find even today are not found online I
maybe five to ten percent of my
Acquisitions are an unlikely most are
meeting people like you and others who
have books and buying them but I'm very
curious I know it seems like we've known
each other a lot longer but it's only
been four years yeah
um but I'm curious
um your early day is how you got
involved well I was about 12 and I went
into a bookstore in Winchester I was
going for an interview at the school
there and I was fascinated at the
beginning of the shop there were books
you know for a pound and two pounds
books I could maybe afford and then as I
went deeper into the shop there was you
know unlettered car pigskin books first
editions and you know I got very excited
that this is the way that my literary
Heroes first appeared in the world you
know and I found that incredibly
exciting but it's funny because I was
not only interested in the material I
was interested in why one book was a
pound and one book was a hundred pounds
when they were tall intense I was very
fascinated but what made that market I I
spent all the money I had I actually got
a very late edition of itals of the King
by Tennyson signed by Tennyson I think
it cost me seven pounds but all I had on
me I sold it later when I was at
University for about 200 pounds
um so I I wanted to actually buy and
sell these things that I wanted to buy
and sell the most exciting books that I
could possibly find well and I remember
in the early days I somehow thought old
met more valuable yes and it didn't take
me long to determine from now why are
some books 50 years old were thousands
of dollars where you can find the book
that's 500 years old
for even less and I started bit by bit I
kind of stumbled into this profession
and so it's been pretty much self-taught
and learning about it at Book Fairs and
other other events but
so from there
so you developed as a young person you
developed this passion for books
absolutely and I started going around
obviously way before the internet and
discovering that you know in one shop a
book might be 30 pounds in another shop
it was 70 pounds so I thought maybe
there's a business that I can sell the
book that I I could buy it for 30 pounds
and set it to 35 pounds and literally
how I started was
dealing in between Sharps and um you
know I made mistakes and but I had some
good moments too
people have asked me that question too
have you ever
bought something
made a mistake and it's like yeah half
the time all the time
um
and then I've had people say I'm
concerned about buying a fake book or a
forged book and I said that a book
that's like buying a a forged car
there's too many moving parts now when
it gets to inscriptions and other things
that's in there but absolutely yeah but
um so where did you where was your first
books my first bookstore was in Dallas
Texas well I mean and now you were
working at University I was yeah I was
working I was in university in Bristol
and I used to scar all the shops there
and all around the West country and then
I had a good contact I had a lot of
friends who were at Oxford and
Blackwell's in Oxford I made a very good
contact there and so I'd Scar the
country and I would take them out the
Blackwells and they'd buy a lot off me
because I had quite a good eye and I
could was quite happy to leave a profit
and things you know I'd take a small
margin and they could make a markup
um I think in my final year at
University I sold 90 000 pounds worth of
books the black world not at a huge
margin but that was a lot and actually
the manager of Blackwell's had me
audited for profitability if you didn't
know he thought maybe there was
something going on because I was telling
them so many books and it actually
proved that I showed a profit for the
company so I was thrilled by that no
that's right you know so and I still I
still deal with dealing with the trade a
lot I'm quite happy to
you know to make the short margin and so
I just like buying it's actually the
acquisition and the chase that I like
most and the meeting people and uh
people always ask me what's your
favorite book and I will say the next
one absolutely
um when was your first brick and mortar
storm like where you actually had a
proper shop your your first home was in
Dallas then
yes yeah well it was in Dallas it was
part of an insurance agency but then
when I made the break we did finally get
our own separate shop
although even before well it was always
part of something it was never
Standalone it could never support itself
yeah it actually started about 10 years
early when we had some friends who were
operating we had a joint lease and they
their business was failing and we had to
take over this extra space the question
is what are we getting to do with this
extra space we put in some books yeah so
that's kind of how it started in the
1970s in Dallas and then 10 years later
I'm out of college and then I get
involved and then I start adding The
Used Books and pretty soon I realized
that was the most popular part of the
store people would rock Walk Right In we
gave it the worst space in the back of
the store
just spying out and people would just
rummage through those and they were
happy to walk up with a stack of books
for thirty dollars yeah that or they
could get two two new books or they
could get seven and
that was eye-opening for me yeah to see
wow there is an interest here and people
still love bookstores you know that I
mean it's it's a harder thing to to run
you've got to work it in a different way
um uh well I know 2008 910 the worldwide
meltdown over half of all bookstores
closed and yeah reopened and people have
asked me why and I said well first of
all I feel that most bookstore owners
kind of do it out of a passion without a
lot of business
uh experience and so they kind of just
kind of stay there
um
and
with all things going digital everybody
says how does it feel you're going to be
out of business but it's like no that
kind of stopped about
10 years ago and there's a Resurgence
art at least my bookstore
is the traffic is increasing year by
year yeah I mean you have a particularly
sort of interesting stock in the way
that you know all your books tell a
story that you know that they attract
people by the nature of what they are
and I think that will always be so I
mean it's um people will always be
attracted by that kind of
um pulling power of you know stories of
stories and it's about telling their own
book sellings in a way about telling
stories about a book and
um linking it in
um
yeah that's right um now back to a shop
so you had an interesting story about
the opening of your store in Nottingham
I did I had several bookstores before
that but yes I I opened one in Notting
Hill around about the time of um Notting
Hill the movie okay and someone
introduced me to Hugh Grant and I asked
you if he would um can't open it for me
so he did he pretended to be my
assistant because that was his sort of
part in the movie and uh okay it was a
great so we had a fantastically
glamorous opening party and I did I had
a shop in Mayfair also dealing in more
antiquarian old books but the shop in
Notting Hill I was dealing in modern
first editions photography Counter
Culture sort of slightly more modern end
of it and I made it a
you know a very modern shop there was no
straight edges you know most bookshops
are very linear it was all curved edges
and it was actually very successful I
mean not you know people loved it it's
what and they and I displayed books as
objects very much and uh it was good fun
it was um can you tell us about any
interesting customers that you've had
oh well that's always I've had so many I
mean I I think all I mean
um
can I tell you about interesting clients
that I've had
um you start
oh well
the crazy thing today
is I actually have to sign mbas with a
lot of my clients non-disclosure reviews
because they don't want people to know
mainly what they have and so
all of my most interesting customers I
can't even tell you who they are but
they buy books I I think that I mean I
think that that's the same I mean I did
have one cloud in math who just sold
this company for quite a lot who and I I
even I got on with him very well I
thought you'd actually really enjoy the
whole process of buying books you've got
that kind of mind that would really
enjoy the collecting game and I had a
first edition of Newton's principle of
Mathematica which is a valuable book and
so I sent him the facts at the time or
I've forgotten how I communicated saying
I've got this and said I just bought one
of those I thought well okay so I found
a Copernicus day revolution of this
which of the time was perhaps the most
expensive work in the science field
and I forgotten like it was it's a lot
of money 365 000 I think dollars at the
time and it just sent me a two two word
reply send it
but he was incredible you know and
inspiring client so you just meet people
that just suddenly get captured by the
world and actually want to collect these
things
um and it's not been a crazy thing to do
with money over the time I always think
oh gosh you know they're spending all
this money but they you know I'm I'm
always buying books for more than I sold
you know the last one for you know that
um it seems to sort of good things seem
to sort of catch up with himself
what
um so you've
you mentioned those the scientific books
the Newton and Copernicus
um
what's the most interesting copy of
Shakespeare that you've had
well I've had the first failure of
Shakespeare 1623
more than one I've had two one one
complete one which I bought at auction
you know with a client in mind and
um one which was defected but um there
was a defective copy recently at celeb
is that also Chris is that brought a
great deal of money much greater more
than I sold my own pool
um
what about talking
I've never really
understood I've had I've had inscribed
copies of The Hobbit I've had inscribed
copies of Lord of the Rings but I never
I never really I've never really
focused on I feel I've never really
focused on Modern first editions I've
I've had all these things particularly
when I had the shop in Nottingham gay
and I enjoy them but I mean it's
probably the older books that I
I I'm more there to
um I somehow I would buy these things if
I came across them but I yeah I mean I
know that you do do a lot with Tolkien
yeah I um I saw you had actually
tolkien's copy of the Bible which is a
extraordinary thing with annotations by
Tolkien yeah
yeah
um
people always ask me what's your white
whale what's the one book you want to
get and I say well the books that I
would like to get the reason we know
about them is because they're already an
institution yeah they're already owned
the question is what is out there that
is going to surface
and those books continue to surface at a
regular pace and they surface at Book
Fairs like this weekend will be a book
fair
and
people say what are you looking for and
I say oh no when I see it absolutely
it doesn't take me long when you show me
something okay yeah that yeah okay I can
already Envision who I'm going to show
it to or it fills this Gap yeah and like
we were talking about earlier
people say when are you going to retire
and it's like I don't have to because I
wouldn't change what I'm doing
absolutely yeah
and it's it's one of those that I think
you just continue as long as you stay
caught up you just get better at what
you're doing
and so
I I tell people I've yet to meet anybody
ever trade places with as far as what I
do because yeah it's quite at least at
this stage in the early days it was I
had to do everything because I couldn't
afford to pay anybody
anything but now I have a very
you know great crew that helps out
allows me to literally travel the world
tracking down rare books and documents
it's just the best it's and you're
always learning because the books are
the stories and when you learn about
them it just expands you
know knowledge Horizon and your your
view of the world so it's just it's it's
it's
a fantastic
occupation it really it's a privilege to
be doing and I'm also fortunate I always
get to take family or friends along with
me
when I travel by myself then I just
spend all my time looking for books and
that's just what I focus on but um
a trip like this is just ideal and you
get to visit with friends take a little
break in between Book Fairs so
I really thank you for taking time
giving me a little
sit down and we'll have to do another
sit down in the future and compare notes
I'd like that very much thank you Reed
thank you very much
