Book People snaps up Qwerkity to reach new market

A BOOK retailer which is owned by a Yorkshire-based private equity firm has secured an acquisition to help it expand into a new market.

Book People has acquired Qwerkity, a mail order and online gift business, from its private owners.

Endless backed the management buyout of The Book People in a £15m deal in 2014. Since its acquisition by Endless, Book People has developed its e-commerce business and it now has specialist analytics, merchandising and customer acquisition and retention teams.

Qwerkity distributes eight million catalogues per year and has a strong market position with older customers, Endless said. Qwerkity was founded in 1989 by Jane Hudson as a mail order business. Its revenue in the year ended January 2017 was £9.1m.

The Endless spokesman added: “Book People has also been through a similar evolution since it was established in 1988, and today it sells through its online and mail order channel, along with its local bookseller network. This unique mix of sales channels provides the company with a strong platform for future growth, with revenues in the year to December 2016 of £79m.”

Endless said that Book People has increased the content and information available on its site “to reinforce its reputation as the authoritative provider of books and expertise for children’s reading”.

Endless has offices in Leeds, London and Manchester and is investing its fourth fund of £525m.

The firm focuses on carve outs from large corporates, acquisitions from other private equity houses, management buyouts and turnarounds.

Over the last two years, Endless has completed 15 deals, involving businesses such as Jones Bootmaker, Carpet & Flooring, Imtech, MTI, Arran Aromatics and Essential Fleet Services.

The firm has a portfolio of 23 businesses with total revenues of more than £2bn.

Book People’s management believe that Qwerkity’s strong brand and customer base, will combine successfully with their company’s online expertise.