The famed Gangarams will be opening shortly on Church Street —Satish B.

Bengaluru:

The landmark Gangaram’s Book Bureau, which closed down last March, 35 years after it first opened on M.G. Road on May 9, 1977, will be back in business by the month-end.

The iconic store, that was the only one of its kind in the city for book lovers before the onslaught of the big box book retailers, will now be located on the second floor of Triumph Towers on Church Street, two floors above Habitat, the well known audio/video circulating library. The building is diagonally opposite the popular restaurant Mainland China.

While the earlier store was spread across three floors spanning 7,500 sqft –  one floor dedicated to stationery, one for general books and another for academic books – the new store will be spread across one spacious floor spanning 8,200 sqft, but minus the stationery.

“Selling stationery is not very profitable, therefore we are discontinuing it. Our new store is spacious, allows for easy browsing and will offer one million titles across categories”, said Atmaram N. Gangaram.

On how different the new store will be, he said, “Any customer who walks into our store looking for books will get whatever he or she wants within 24 hours. If he’s looking for two books in a category, he will get 10, that’s the kind of variety we will offer. If the book that a customer wants is not available in India, we will source and deliver it to them from anywhere in the world within four working days” he said.

On entering the store, you will see an entire selection of bestsellers from fiction and non-fiction categories under the name ‘Gangaram’s Picks’. The largest section in the store is dedicated to children’s books, and in the fiction category, some of the oldest titles which are 70-80 years old from authors such as H.G. Wells, will be available.

The new book store was originally due to open above Koshy’s on St Mark’s Road where the British Council was located earlier. The property belongs to the St Mark’s Cathedral.

“The building was very weak and the Church, Koshy’s and us had committed to jointly renovating and strengthening the structure. However, Prem Koshy decided not to go ahead because of the cost involved and therefore, that did not work out for us. Hence, the delay in re-opening our store”, said Atmaram.

source: http://wwww.DeccanChronicle.com / Home> News> Current Affairs / by DC, Sangeetha Chengappa / February 21st, 2013