A Welsh bookshop has been announced as the overall winner of the Independent Bookshop of the Year Award by the The British Book Awards 2023. Griffin Books in Penarth is the "smallest shop ever" to claim the top spot, after previously being named the country winner in Wales.
Griffin Books opened its doors in 2014 and is a community focused independent bookstore, known for hosting excellent author events, book signings, weekly toddler story time sessions and a number of book clubs for adults, children and teens. The store was praised for its adaptability, emerging from Brexit, the pandemic, and cost-of-living crisis closer to its community and stronger than ever.
Mel Griffin, 58, owner of Griffin Books, spoke to WalesOnline about winning the award. She said: "It's absolutely mindblowing. We all do what we do day in and day out and are so passionate about it, but you don't always realise the impact you're having in the community around you and the wider bookselling community, so it's just fantastic to get that recognition."
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Griffin Books beat 59 other bookstores in the UK. Mel explained how she and her staff focus on "finding the perfect book for every person and collecting books with audiences, and audiences with books."
She added: "We do whatever we can not only to get people to visit the shop, but to take books and the love of reading out into the community. We're a small physical shop so we're limited to what we can do in the shop, but we don't see our walls as a barrier. We do a lot of taking authors into schools, we take authors to local venues and run our events there. We do pop up book stalls wherever we can - I have a regular place in St David's Hall during the classical concert series. It's really about being out there in the community rather than expecting people to come to us."
The popular bookstore has held spectacular events over the years, Mel added: "In the last year, a couple of highlights were Maggie O'Farrell who wrote Hamnet and had been promoting her latest book, The Marriage Portrait - she's a fabulous author and we did a sell out event with her with about 250 people. More recently, Bonnie Garmus, who wrote probably the book of the year which swept the boards last night, which is Lessons in Chemistry. Before that we've done rugby names, Warren Gatland, Sam Warburton and so forth. We do a bit of everything - some big and some small - we're also proud of the smaller things we do, celebrating a local author, debut novelist, it all has it's place."
Griffin Books is also "delighted" to sponsor a local Penarth football team, Penarthinaikos FC, which Mel's "really proud of" as they recently won the local league. The bookstore also has its own literary festival, which is coming up in the middle of June "with lots going on for all ages and reading tastes."
Mel said that the store owes its success to the local community who helped them during the pandemic. She said: "During the pandemic it was quite clear that books were one of the things that would keep people going through that time and our author events which we took online during that time, trying to keep things going as much as we could to keep people interested and engaged.
The support from other local businesses in Penarth was also vital for the bookstore. Mel added: "We had fantastic support during the pandemic and from our fellow businesses. There was a time we weren't able to open physically, but our neighbouring business which was considered an essential service was able to and they very kindly allowed people to collect their book orders from their shop - we all work together in Penarth, it's community support from our customers but also between businesses in the community which is a thriving and active community of independents."
As a teenager, Mel used to be a Saturday girl in her local book store and it was always her "lifelong dream" to own a bookshop. She said: "I worked in one as a Saturday girl when I was a teenager and carried on working there - in my hometown of Dorset - through to university holidays and I always thought way back then it would be my dream to have my own bookshop."
However, she went on to pursue another career for the best part of 30 years before the idea came back to her when she was living in Penarth. She said: "It just gradually came clear that it was what I wanted to do and the timing was perfect as the previous owners wanted to retire, so over a couple of years period I learnt the ropes with their support and finally got the keys in September, 2014."
The British Book Awards 2023 awarded Griffin Books a £5,000 cash prize, which Mel hopes to use to put into a community fund to help with the work they already do with schools and the community. She added: "Often with the cost of our events or having an author coming into the school can be prohibitive, maybe the travel to one of our events or something like that. We would love to have a fund that we could use to subsidise some of the schools we would love to reach and enable them to participate in what we do."
Mel wanted to give a big thanks to her team for making it happen, especially Holly who put in the application, Rachel, Dawn, Elin, Lucy and her two lovely Saturday girls Lauren and Jess, and added: "Maybe they'll follow in my footsteps one day and have their own bookshop - that's how I started after all."
Tom Tivnan, The Bookseller managing editor and chair of the Independent Bookshop of the Year judges, said: “In many ways it has been a watershed 12 months for indie bookshops in general across the UK and Ireland. Consequently, this has been arguably the most competitive Independent Bookshop of the Year with nine incredibly strong regional and country winners. Yet, Griffin Books caught the judging panels' eyes by going above and beyond. It is one of the smallest shops to ever win this award, but its unceasing innovation means its footprint far exceeds its square footage. From its knockout events stream (including its own literary festival) to subscription services and its online arm, Griffin has consistently demonstrated that its impact stretches far beyond its four walls. Above all, Griffin’s local ties - such as its work with schools, charities and even sponsoring a football club - show just how important a bookshop can be to a community.”
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