SAD NEWS via facebook as another two branches of Living Oasis prepare to close their doors on July 2nd. Nottingham’s facebook update says it all:
Living Oasis Nottingham and Worthing slated for closure July 2, 2011
Sad news, after 5.30 Saturday 2/7/11 we will be closed down. Living Oasis Worthing also finishing then. Heartfelt thanks to our customers for giving us so much support loyalty and encouragement. Please pray for there to be a Christian bookshop in Nottingham, pray for our colleagues at Worthing, pray for the staff of the remaining Living Oasis shops. Bless you.
A similar facebook update was posted by LivingOasis Worthing on 24th June:
Sad news Living Oasis Worthing is closing on the 2nd of July. Please pray for David, Sabine and Andrea, that the Lord will guide us.
h/t Melanie Carroll, @unicorntreebks:
@notbovvered @philgroom worthing as you reported and also today on fb Nottingham announced they too close on the 2nd. Very very sad.—
melanie carroll (@unicorntreebks) June 25, 2011
June 26, 2011 at 10:31 am
Desperately sad news – God bless all. I’m losing track of how few LO shops there now are.
June 26, 2011 at 11:11 am
I think with these two gone we’re down to only
sixseven currently trading —eightnine if we include Leeds & Liverpool, but being realistic, the Phase 2 openings seem to be looking less & less likelyJune 29, 2011 at 1:53 pm
Looks like good news for Liverpool, new signs up and a proposed opening date in September!
June 26, 2011 at 12:16 pm
It’s extra sad for these shops as they had to face, as did the SPCK shops, the closure of the Wesley Owen shops, the hope of a new owner, then closure again. So many larger towns and cities no do not have a Christian bookshop which is so bad for Christian witness on the High Street.
June 26, 2011 at 6:34 pm
i’ve started typing a comment about 12 times and still cannot find a reasonable way to express my sadness and anger and frustration and this news.
June 26, 2011 at 6:47 pm
I personally find Nottingham’s closure especially sad: I lived in Nottingham for two years back in the 90s and was a frequent visitor to the shop back in its heyday as the Congregational Federation shop… then Wesley Owen took it over in 2008/9 or thereabouts, which was supposed to secure its future … and now this. Beyond sad
June 26, 2011 at 7:48 pm
A time to mourn, a time to dance.
It is only a time to mourn if we know there will never again be a Christian bookshop in Nottingham. We do not know that, so not a time to mourn.
A time to dance? Well, not at the moment; After 2/7 there will be no shop.
So, a time to pray. Please ask our Father to give Nottingham a Christian bookshop. People in Nottingham need it!
Rob
June 26, 2011 at 8:59 pm
Whoa, Rob: this isn’t Nottingham’s only Christian bookshop, is it? What about Olive Tree (Sherwood), Mustard Seed (Gedling) and Christian Book Centre (Beeston) — or have they all gone to the wall as well?
June 26, 2011 at 10:57 pm
It’s the only one in Nottingham town centre that I know of…
The Olive Tree – Closed Sept 2010ish
Mustard Seed – I think it’s still open, but I’m unsure of the current opening hours
Christian Book Centre – Will at the very least have to move due to the tram line being extended down that road. (As will all the other shops on the same side of the street)
June 26, 2011 at 11:19 pm
Mustard seed was still open last year and the Christian Book Centre in Beeston is still going well I am reliably informed – I don’t know about the tram line and moving though, I think that might be a time off yet as I am told it and the music shop above it is still in good health by those who use it regularly.
The Victoria Centre in Nottingham has an indoor market with a lot of vacant stalls – I am sure it would be a perfect place to set up a christian bookshop/stall by an imaginative and outgoing entrepreneurial type – they even offer start up deals and assistance I believe!
Meanwhile it would be rather nice if people could do all they can to support the other christian bookshops already in the area and rejoice that at least they have them within their city limits even if not in the city centre itself, and indeed that they support the staff at the LO shop in this last week – perhaps take them some chocolates, a hug, a thank you and a prayer for their future.
I however will mourn the passing of another Christian bookshop and the loss of the jobs for the people that work there and the loss of the outreach they had been doing, it seems to me this really is something to mourn even though our tears may yet turn to dancing on another day – for today we mourn that another witness is going, that another bookshop is closing it’s doors.
June 26, 2011 at 11:29 pm
Yes, Beeston shop is several miles (guess about five, so a healthy walk!)away from Nottingham, Mustard Seed is Gedling not Nottingham. Can be reached by car, maybe bus. Olive Tree was Sherwood (3 miles north of city)but closed last September. was my and my church’s local shop, sadly missed. Living Oasis is the only Christian shop in Nottingham city itself. When I moved to Nottingham over 30 years ago there was a choice of shops.So please pray for this city, for there to be a Christian bookshop; not only so it can sell Christian books, cards, gifts, sliding whistles (!) etc, but for the much more important role of providing a safe place, comfort and prayer for those who need it.
June 27, 2011 at 6:48 pm
Thanks Rob and Dan. Sad to learn about the Olive Tree: I’ll update my UKCBD records this week.
Would there be any mileage in local churches getting together with the Congregational Fed, who own the premises? It worked with the URC in Cardiff when the SPCK bookshop went sideways…
http://christianbookshopsblog.org.uk/tag/cardiff/
June 27, 2011 at 9:59 pm
I wouldn’t want to bet on that working, people were wary about christian bookshops in nottingham after what happened with WO, never mind after this little disaster…
Having said that, it’s worth consideration
June 28, 2011 at 9:15 am
The problem seems to be that churches won’t work together will they?
The LO vision was for churches to buy in and share vision/resources/premises, and bills. It was the fact that local Nottingham Churches seem more interested in being successful themselves. Sharing the LO vision costs money, and there is not much surplus of that at the moment. If there had been the will the vision was there.And without vision etc…
June 29, 2011 at 8:10 pm
“if we include Leeds & Liverpool, but being realistic, the Phase 2 openings seem to be looking less & less likely
”
Actually Phil, Liverpool have uploaded photos to their Facebook today showing their new building with the new sign in place. Perhaps we could save our speculation until we know the facts?
June 29, 2011 at 8:53 pm
Excellent news indeed, O Interested One: thank you. The sad fact is, unfortunately, that repeated requests for information from Living Oasis to enable reporting have been met not only with silence but with instructions to staff not to communicate with me and to block me from their facebook pages. It’s a very strange PR approach, to say the least; and by anyone’s standards, a delay of 6 months, especially when accompanied by this communications blockade, does tend to make said openings look a tad unrealistic…
The good news is that I’m compiling my next News Roundup and this news has emerged just in time for that: thank you for letting me know; and if you have any influence with Living Oasis, perhaps you’d be kind enough to encourage them to remove their communications block, please?
June 29, 2011 at 10:57 pm
Honestly 6 of 1 half a dozen of the other as me mum likes to say when me and my sister get into it!
Anyway according to the LOLiverpool site it might be fair to say that both Phil and Interested Reader are in part right and wrong in their speculations:
Especially as on the site under ‘getting involved’ it clearly says:
So then in this case not unfair to say that phase 2 might yet be a way off but happily phase 1 is almost within reach!
The pictures of the new shop do look good and I only hope they do open their doors soon so the liverpool community can share the vision and the space because it looks very big and with much scope.
June 30, 2011 at 7:56 pm
Simply for the record, I wasn’t speculating: I was making an observation. There’s an important difference…
June 30, 2011 at 11:25 am
Story reported by The Bookseller this morning: looks like they’re up against a communications blockade too: Living Oasis close two more branches
July 2, 2011 at 11:17 am
[...] NOT ONLY farewell to Nottingham and Worthing today, but also farewell to Julie Jowett, who has now left Living Oasis Harrogate and her role as the [...]