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Gardners Group buys Holt Jackson

03.03.08 Graeme Neill

Gardners' owner The Little Group has acquired library supplier Holt Jackson Book Company for an undisclosed sum.

Kathryn Pattinson, m.d. of library supplier Askews, which Little Group purchased in September last year, will become managing director of Holt Jackson. Both Askews and Holt Jackson will continue to trade under their existing identities.

Kevin Holden, the company's longstanding c.e.o and chairman, will also continue on the board of directors. Little Group said Holden "will be actively involved in the day to day running of the company along with the existing senior management team".

Holt Jackson was one of the last remaining independent library suppliers in the United Kingdom. It was founded in Lancashire in 1932 and has an annual turnover of approximately £17m. Little Group estimate that annual sales across the group will now be more than £200m following the takeover.

Jonathan Little, chairman of the Little Group, said that the purchase "strengthened the supply chain and support services to the public library market". "Under the direction of Kevin Holden and his senior managers, they have offered a well respected and much appreciated service to their library customers and we look forward to building on this to provide even better services in the future for both new and existing customers," he said.

libraries Gardners Graeme Neill Home library supply Holt Jackson

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By JULIAN RIVERS

A quite important , though inevitable development in the supply chain . Many will recall that Bertrams merged with Cypher [now Bertrams Library Services] in 1999 to much hullabaloo from publishers, Gardners and the library suppliers . Now the library authorities have just two main consolidating suppliers for public libraries, Gardners and Bertrams . One benefit will be that libraries will get cheaper books because the publishers will effectively pay , as a result of the assimilation of wholesaler terms and the cessation of lower and exploitative library supply discounts.Bertrams commenced this programme in 1999 to much hissing from these parties, now involved . It is interesting to see that the market has regulated itself in that the over supply of the shrinking public library book market [about £90m ]has now essentially settled with the two national wholesalers . In total, however, the entire public library market will be worth less to these wholesalers than their combined trading with the leading internet bookseller . [Please be aware I am no longer linked to Bertrams and write independently].

03 Mar 08 16:30

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