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JOYLAND BOOKS CONFIDENTIAL: THE STORY Article: Added April 2010 |
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In April 2000,
Joyland Book opened its doors to the world wide web, and the
world's biggest retailer of amusement park, fairground, circus
and seaside books and videos was born. This is its story -
everything you didn't know about this unique online retailer...
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It is April
2000 and a small niche bookstore opened on the world wide
web. Theme park planning consultant Nick Laister and his
wife, Nicola, had decided to open an online store to sell a
book he was in the process of writing, which would later
become Pennies by the Sea.
Essentially, the website would be a way of promoting a book
that would have a very specialist audience.
In 2000,
although expanding rapidly, the internet was still in its
infancy. Nick was aware that in the 1990s the amount of
books available on the subjects of amusement parks and
roller coasters had increased significantly and there was no
one place on the web that brought it all together. He therefore decided that
this website could start to dip its toes into this area, so
that by the time of the release of 'Pennies by the Sea', the
website would have built up a customer base. The website
would provide a place where anybody with an interest in
the wonderful world of amusement parks and rides could find
a selection of books that otherwise would not be
available elsewhere, or if they were, would be hard to find.
If the website worked, it would be an ideal launch pad for
'Pennies by the Sea'.
The website
was initially set up at Nick and Nicola's home in Wantage,
Oxfordshire, using free web space on Freeserve, with a very
basic website assembled on the now long defunct Microsoft
FrontPage Express software. The web address of the site was the not
particularly memorable www.joylandbooks.fsnet.co.uk.
But Joyland
Books was an immediate success. Nick and Nicola decided to
invest time and money in making Joyland Books a must visit
website for anybody with an interest in amusement parks.
Initially it expanded slowly and cautiously. The
bookstore was expanded in June to start selling secondhand
books, and in July a news service was launched that not only
brought visitors information on new book releases, but also
included the latest theme park news from around the UK.
In 2001, Nick
and Nicola got more ambitious about the growth of Joyland
Books and with a growing confidence implemented a number of major advances,
some of which would involve real financial risk. Early that year, the
website moved from the 'fsnet' website to its own dedicated
domain, joyland.co.uk. This lasted for a few months, before
it was decided to change to a web address that was exactly
the same as the name of the business, plus with a
".com" rather than ".co.uk" address to reflect the high
percentage of orders from overseas. We therefore settled on
joylandbooks.com. That has remained our website and brand
since 2001, and is here to stay.
Also in 2001, Nick and Nicola decided to dip their toes into the world of web forums, and hosted their own fairly basic message board. This had a slow start and was gradually upgraded until the current Forum was launched in January 2003, which is hugely popular and at the time of writing has over 730 registered users.
In July of
that year, Joyland Books made its biggest investment to date
when it started accepting credit cards and allowed for
purchases online via the website. Joyland installed a new
shopping cart system and, unlike most smaller retailers,
decided that rather than simply accepting PayPal, it would
try and
compete with major retailers by accepting credit card
processing. This was a costly, but ultimately successful
move, that assured Joyland's status as a serious retailer.
Customer security was a major consideration in
the upgrade. Joyland Books continues to use the most
advanced encryption technology available. The website
accepts all major cards, including VISA, Mastercard, Maestro
and - unlike a lot of high street names - American Express. However, realising that some customers
still prefer to pay by cheque, Joyland provides printable order forms so that customers can order
via the post. This is an option that many major online
retailers do not offer. These changes were a major financial investment for what
was at the time a very new business, but it has undoubtedly
contributed to Joyland's status as the world's biggest
specialist supplier of amusement park, fairground, circus
and seaside books.
Our final
innovation of 2001 was the expansion from books into
videos,
DVDs,
CD-ROMs and
magazines. Joyland had truly become an
online destination by the end of that big year!
2002 was the
first time the paths of Joyland Books and the famous
Dreamland Amusement Park in Margate were to cross. Nick
Laister produced a
report requesting that the Scenic Railway
- a 1920 wooden roller coaster, the oldest in the country -
be listed by the Department of Culture Media and Sport. In
March 2002 it was announced that the ride was to be listed -
the first time an amusement park ride had become a listed
building. Joyland Books and Dreamland were to become very
closely associated with each other over the coming years.
By mid-2002,
Joyland Books had amassed a huge collection of photographs
of British amusement parks through the years. In recognition
of this vast resource, Joyland Books launched the
Amusement
Park Photographic Library, which supplies the world's media
with images of amusement parks and rides. The site was a
success and continues to this day.
In July of
2002, Joyland opened a brand new department focussing on
seaside books and
videos. This seemed a logical progression
from amusement parks and fairgrounds, and was a resounding
success. By the summer of that year, Joyland was awarded
membership of the Which? Web Trader scheme, which recognised
online retailers of the highest quality. Joyland proudly
remained a member of the scheme until its closure in January
2003.
In January
2003, Joyland Books launched a
campaign to save Margate's
Dreamland Amusement Park. Joyland had led the campaign which
secured listed building status the previous year. The
Campaign, which is still running at the time of writing, has
also spawned a
trust for the rebuilding of Dreamland as the
world's first amusement park of historic rides. Funding of
£12m has been received or committed to the project, and the
Joyland Books-based campaign has rescued numerous rides from
the scrapheap, including all the historic rides from
Southport's Pleasureland.
Between 2003
and 2007, Joyland Books experimented with operating a sales
stand at fairground related events, including several
Fairground Weekends at the Dingles Fairground Heritage Centre
in Devon and the Fairground Model Show at Long Eaton. Whilst
this was a good way to extend the brand and meet people, it
proved not be a profitable venture when travel and other
costs were taken into account, and Joyland Books retreated
back into cyberspace.
In a further
expansion, 2005 saw the introduction of our massive Circus
store, with books,
DVDs and an unbelievable collection of
rare and out-of-print books. This store has now grown to be
the world's largest.
In October
2006, the book Pennies by the Sea: the Life and Times of
Joyland Amusements, Bridlington by Nick Laister was
released. This was something of a milestone as it is the
planning of this book in the late 1990s that resulted in the
launch of Joyland Books in the first place (see
interview
with Nick Laister). In the run-up to the launch, Joyland
Books founder, Nick Laister, held a special evening of
amusement memories at Bridlington Library. the book itself
was released on 15 October 2006, and was celebrated with the
launch of a special website:
www.joylandbridlington.co.uk.
And, yes, this is the same web address that was previously
used by Joyland Books in its early years. Some websites have
not updated their links, so some people expecting to visit
Joyland Books end up on a website about a Bridlington
amusement arcade!
As the decade
progressed, it became clear to Nick Laister that Joyland
Books was becoming more than a store; it was becoming a
destination, especially for people with an interest in the
history of amusement parks. In an unexpected move in 2007, Joyland
Books relaunched the world's best loved amusement park
nostalgia website, Gary Radice's themagiceye, which had
closed down a few months before. Joyland pledged to bring
the entire website back over several months, and then to
develop it further to cement its already strong position on
the World Wide Web.
The project was a great success, with the entire original
website online by the end of 2009 and a programme of new
articles and features now being rolled out.
Then came the
big move. In October 2008, Joyland moved from its original
home (in an extension to a residential dwelling at Wantage,
Oxfordshire) to its new, 5-acre site near Chipping Norton.
The move to Southcombe Farm was a difficult time for Nick
and Nicola, as running a business whilst moving house, when
the business is moving as well, was almost impossible.
Delivery times slowed to around 10 days, instead of the
usual 2 to 3 days. Books were dispatched from a residential
dwelling in Didcot, Oxfordshire, and finding books became
exceptionally difficult with large parts of the stock in
storage in Banbury and the rest in boxes.
Finally,
Joyland landed at Southcombe Farm in November 2008. The Farm
comes with numerous outbuildings - a barn, stables, a
recording studio, two-storey workshops, a former farm shop
and a house! Joyland Books now has a dedicated office in a
150-year-old Cotswold stone building and the former
recording studio is used for book storage. The business got
back to normal quickly, and with masses of expansion space
it now has room to grow.
The business
took something of a hit in late 2008, though. This was
probably brought on by the large message on the front page
warning people of delays in delivery caused by the move. It
set the business back several years in terms of both website hits and
sales. Or was that the effects of the credit crunch turning
into a full-blown recession? Whatever the reason, it took
Joyland Books almost a year to recover from the effects of
the move, but recover it did, and is now powering along more
successful than ever.
Joyland will
continue to expand and remain true to its core business
focussing on being the best place to visit on the world wide
web for amusement park, fairground, circus and
seaside-related books, DVDs, CDs and other merchandise. We
will continue to support the
Save Dreamland Campaign and the
efforts to build a thrilling theme park from the past in
Margate. We will bring you more outstanding articles and
galleries of interest to our customers in
themagiceye and
the Amusement Park Photographic Library will remain the
first choice of the world's media for images of amusement
parks and rides.
In addition to this, we continue to work on
plans to bring Joyland Books out of the internet and into
the real world as part of a new visitor attraction in
Oxfordshire. Planning permission has already been granted
for what will be a unique place for children to visit. More on that on the Joyland Books News Page
over the coming months...
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