“Print books will always be the preferred model”

Though Parle Book Centre Distributors started their journey in distribution 20 years back but they have been in the books business for 51 years. Here’s more on the same.

The genesis…

“Our retail outlet Parle Book Center (PBC) was established by my father Vasant Shah 51 years back. It was one of the most prominent retail outlet in Mumbai as a one stop shop for educational, library resources and stationery for all educational institutions. Before the launch of internet, we were the only outlet to procure and fulfil the customer individual requirement to their satisfaction. I was working in the store since I was 24 years old. While working there I understood the supply chain involved in the distribution for academic books to schools and that is how PBC Distributors was born 20 years back,” tells Nilesh Shah, Director, Parle Book Centre Distributors.

The journey…

“When I was at the retail counter, I gauged the economies of supply and demand which propelled us to introduce the distributorship model. So far the journey has been amazing and fulfilling. In the recent times, the model has evolved to being more competitive however our long term relationships and excellent service levels have helped us maintain a competitive edge in the market,” he adds.

Sharing more about his journey in distribution, Nilesh says, “The technology advancements have brought in more efficiency in the supply chain process by making it more accessible globally. We are grateful that our supply of books has enabled us to be able to contribute to the education industry for the past 51 years.”

Meeting the needs of K-12 education…

Parle Book Center was one of the first to meet the requirements of schools with ICSE curriculum. “Infact, we were one of the first outlets to understand the changing environment in the education industry and hence implemented a distribution chain catering for academic resources to international curriculum schools across India. Today we fulfil the requirements of top notch international curriculum schools across India from Grade K to 12,” he shares.

Distribution tie-ups…

“Along with having distributorship rates with the majority of international publishers, we also have exclusive distributor rights with Alston Publishing, Shingley, Sadlier and many other publishers. We have introduced multiple curriculums in the interest for international curriculum schools from UK, US, Singapore, Australia, Scotland. We also offer a wider collection of second language books such as Spanish, French and many more,” he shares.

Distribution network…

“We distribute academic and library resources to top schools of international curriculums across India region wise. We have an aggressive sales and efficient operations team totalling to about 15. Our main head office is in Mumbai and we also have three branch offices in Bangalore, Chennai, and Delhi,” he tells. “Our retail and distribution channels only function from Mumbai and Delhi.”

The clients…

“We cater to the top notch schools with international curriculum and distributors across India region wise,” tells Nilesh.

Challenges faced…

“The debut of Amazon India has brought an additional layer in the distribution in the form of resellers who do not have a control over the authenticity of the books,” tells Nilesh.

From distribution to publishing…

“In the year 2016, we even ventured into the publishing industry Harbour Press International which is one of the leading academic publishers across India catering to CBSE and ICSE curriculums. We were one of the quickest amongst other publishers to create titles within a span of one and a half year for both the curriculums,” tells Nilesh.

Going digital…

“During the pandemic period, the changes in market dynamics helped evolve School Store which is an online innovative and collaborative one stop shop for fulfilment of all academic resources for all the school students in the comfort of their homes,” briefs Nilesh.

“Furthermore, we also implemented the Class One platform in the year 2020 which is single engagement platform for students and faculty with customized arrangements. Class One is a one stop shop whereby a child with a single log on gets access to etext book version of the physical books. It gives improved access and communication for the children and the teachers,” he adds.

“Moreover, we introduced teacher workshops for the school faculty which made teaching more effective by helping them learn to be more interactive and interesting,” he tells.

Talking more about the changes during pandemic, Nilesh adds, “With the changing needs of the pandemic, we adopted the supply of interactive Ebook model along with our print model as additional support for schools. We have tieups with various ebook platform providers to enable the same.”

On a concluding note…

“We strongly believe that although the ebook model has been introduced in line with the current requirements, however, demand of print books will always be a preferred model. The print books are a joy to behold, they help absorb more information, they are easy on the eye and one becomes a better reader,” concludes Nilesh.