'You can judge a book by its cover': Inside The Book Corner at Halifax's Piece Hall

It was 2011, and a decade or so of rising e-book, Kindle and Amazon sales, along with the end of the net book agreement meaning supermarkets could start selling cheaper books, was enough to spook many bookshop owners into jumping ship from the industry altogether.

But when the owner of The Book Case in Hebden Bridge retired that year, something made Kate decide to take it on.

She’d been working there part time while training to become a teacher, and really enjoyed it. She didn’t want to change jobs, and it would fit in with her and her son’s lives.

“I just decided, maybe I should take on the shop,” she says.

Fast forward 15 years, and The Book Case is a thriving stalwart of the Hebden Bridge high street.

Things turned out so well, in fact, that when in 2017 Kate was given the opportunity to open a second bookshop in Halifax’s Piece Hall, she jumped at the chance.

At the time, the Piece Hall was just re-opening after its major refurbishment, and despite it being an “exciting” time for Kate, there was still an element of risk involved.

“The rent was quite high and obviously we didn’t know what the future was going to be like – it had been closed for so long,” she recalls.

“We didn’t know what was happening behind those big boards, we hadn’t seen all the rejuvenation that was going on.”

Nine years on, however, and The Book Corner is a destination bookshop, loved by locals and tourists alike.

“There’s so many other independent shops here in The Piece Hall,” Kate says.

“It’s a really lovely environment to be an independent trader in; it’s a beautiful, social environment, and it’s a real jewel in the crown of Halifax, I think, so it’s an absolute privilege to have a shop here.”

The busiest time of the year for The Book Corner is Christmas, which actually starts on “Big Thursday” in September, when all the big books for Christmas come out.

“That’s always a really exciting time, when you see what’s coming up,” Kate notes.

Last Christmas, the shop was inundated with customers.

“This year we thought we might need to have an entrance/exit system, because the shop was so full, we thought we might have to stop customers coming in and have some sort of queuing system.”

Like many businesses, Kate said the pandemic has been The Book Corner’s most difficult trading period to date, but that her experience with the Hebden Bridge store taught her lessons which served her well during Covid.

The Hebden Bridge store was flooded a couple of times, and had to start again from scratch, and for a time they were unable to get insurance for the shop.

As a result, Kate always ensured there was a contingency fund to secure the future of the business in the event of any unforeseen events.

“I learnt then that it was important to have our own contingency fund, and that’s something I’ve always done in business since then, to have a cushion.

"It means that if something does go wrong you’ve got some money to keep the lights on and pay your staff for a little bit. And that served us well through Covid.”

When you enter The Book Corner, you are struck by the beautiful book covers, many of them outward facing on the shelves, so that you can clearly see their vivid and colourful artwork.

This is a deliberate decision by the business, which recognises the many customers who come to the shop with a gift idea in mind.

Manager Sarah Shaw explains: “What we really go for in here is display, because I think in a lot of the big shops you can’t actually see what you’re selling, whereas here, people come in and everything’s literally in your face, it’s face out, covers.

“We’re very much led by covers as well, we want attractive books in the shop. With it being a tourist destination, the Piece Hall, a lot of it is with a gift idea in mind as well.

“The look of a book is important, whatever anybody says, you can judge a book by it’s cover.”

Something which has done well at The Book Corner since it opened is the shop’s section on books under 200 pages, and more recently fiction in translation.

Japanese and Korean fiction has been particularly popular, with Hooked and Butter by Asako Yuzuki the shop’s most popular fiction books this year.

Contrary to what some might think, bookshops have actually seen a boom over the last 10 years, with customers turning away from screens and looking towards print, Kate says.

“People say that young people don’t buy books anymore, they absolutely do; we have teenagers coming in, they love buying books, they see books on Booktok these days and they want to buy them they want to read them.

“There’s a whole new generation of readers coming up and it’s fantastic,” she says.

“It’s something that people really value in their life, and actually, it’s gone the other way, people really like an analogue thing, they like a book that they can hold in their hand.

“They don’t want to turn a screen on to read, they want to turn their screen off.

"They want to go sit in the sun or sit on their bed and they want to read and interact with a physical book, and I feel like that’s never going to go away.”

- For details of upcoming events at The Book Corner, including a signing with author Phil Earle, visit bookcornerhalifax.com