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Oxfam Book Shop Byres Road relaunch

Oxfam Bookshop Byres Road

330 Byres Road, Glasgow, G12 8AP

The Oxfam Bookshop will be reopening in mid-August, 2015 after a full refurbishment. To celebrate there will be a relaunch event on Friday 21st August 2015.

The shop managers and volunteers are inviting the public to join them to see the shop’s new look. There will be talks from local authors on what bookshops mean to them, refreshments and samples of Fairtrade food.

Further details of the day including talks by authors Denis Mina, Karen Campbell and Alison Irvine

Shop manager Gillian Nelson said:

“We are so excited about the refurbishment and the difference it will make for our volunteers and customers. The new look should make working and shopping with us a better experience and ultimately help us make more money to support Oxfam’s vital work. We can’t wait to get started and look forward to welcoming everyone back to the shop.”

The new shop design aims to give customers and volunteers a greater sense of the global impact they make by donating books, volunteering or shopping at an Oxfam shop. Shop fittings will be created using the same materials that Oxfam uses in it’s life saving emergency response work around the world such as the crates used to transport vital supplies in Nepal after this year’s earthquakes.The shop has always benefited from generous donations by the public. Since it opened in 2002 the Byres Road bookshop has contributed £3.16M to Oxfam raised through sales of donated books, Fairtrade products and cash donations. In 2014/15 it made the largest contribution to the charity of any Oxfam bookshop in the UK.

As well as raising money for Oxfam the bookshop continues to play an important role in the local community with regular literary events like a monthly book group, poetry readings and children’s activity days. It also offers opportunities for volunteers to gain work experience and become part of a community. The shop is staffed by 120 volunteers from several countries including China, Finland, Syria, Germany and South Korea who reflect the global scope of Oxfam as a charity. They have volunteers aged from 14 to 80 who come from a diverse range of backgrounds and are brought together by a love of books and dedication to Oxfam’s causes.

The shop team are very excited about the beginning of this new chapter and look forward to sharing the results of their work with customers, donors and fellow book lovers.

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