The award-winning British book retailer Waterstones operates more than 280 shops, employing around 3,500 staff. The chain’s headquarters are located in London and it has branches across the UK. Its average retail store sells some 30,000 different books.
Waterstones has won numerous industry rewards, enhancing its reputation as a high-quality retailer. In 2008, it won the titles of High Street Retailer of the Year and Headline Bookselling Company of the Year, while its online arm, Waterstones.com, received the silver award for the Best Books Website in BT’s Online Excellence Awards.
Its success has continued throughout the 2000s, receiving further awards such as the 2011 Usborne Children’s Bookseller of the Year, the 2015 Bertram Book Retailer of the Year and the 2017 Bonnier Publishing Book Retailer of the Year.
Brand’s origins
Waterstones was founded in 1982 by Tim Waterstone, who set up the first store in Old Brompton Road, Kensington, using a £6,000 redundancy payment he had received from his former employer, WH Smith. His ambition was to set up a “new breed of bookshop”, based on ideas he had witnessed in the United States.
These included having front-of-shop displays of the works of literary authors and employing highly literate staff, who were personally interested in the products they were selling and had a lot of knowledge of books which they could pass on to customers.
Despite the difficult economic climate of the early 21st century, the successful formula has enabled Waterstones to survive the storm and expand. During 2016, it began a refurbishment programme of many of its shops and revealed sales had remained “buoyant”, despite continued uncertainty over the Brexit vote for Britain to leave the European Union.
One of Waterstones’ flagship retail stores is based in The High Street, Stratford Upon Avon, where customer reviews on its Facebook page have given it a five-star rating, citing its “impressive customer service”, received from “excellent, friendly and well-informed staff.”
New automatic doors
Automatic Access was approached to carry out a refurbishment of the entrance at Waterstones in Stratford Upon Avon, to ensure the retail premises were easily accessible to people of all ages and mobilities. We provided a new pair of automatic doors for the store.
The beauty of our automatic doors is that they are fairly straightforward to install, so if you don’t wish to take advantage of our professional installation services, like Waterstones, you can fit the doors yourself.
The doors have made the store easily accessible, not only for staff and customers, but also for events such as meetings of the Waterstones Reading Group.
For further information about how Automatic Access can provide a bespoke entrance solution for your retail or other business premises, please don’t hesitate to contact us on 0330 4410 666 for information on our professional services.
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