It’s a new kind of rush to the West. That of booksellers, seasoned or recently converted, many of whom choose Brittany to set up their business. Between 2019 and 2022, 48 projects have emerged in the region, barely less than in Île-de-France. And in 2022 alone, seven of these openings took place in Rennes and in other localities of Ille-et-Vilaine, which have become the beating heart of this El Dorado.
After several years spent in Paris, Cassandre Charrier chose Guichen, a town of 9,000 inhabitants, to open the Refuge bookshop. “I worked as a communication officer at Emmaüs, but the wage labor no longer fulfilled me. The bookstore was going back to my first love”, says this graduate of a DUT in book trades who opened her shop in September. .
“As a public service”
About twenty kilometers to the north, Rennes concentrates 21 bookstores, or one for 10,500 inhabitants, when the whole of Brittany has half as many (one for 19,374 inhabitants). Alongside already well-established brands such as Le Failler and Le Forum du livre, the Breton capital welcomed four new stores in 2022 (Critic 2, Comment dire, Nilmë, L’Astrolabe), while a fifth is preparing to open. “Until now, the city center polarized independent bookstores. But in recent years, several have set up in new neighborhoods,” notes Marie-Cécile Grimault, in charge of the book economy within the public establishment. Books and reading in Brittany.
At the end of November, the plain of Baud, a district located to the east of the historic center, will thus host its first bookstore in a “raw concrete” room currently being fitted out. “We distributed a hundred questionnaires to residents of the neighborhood to refine our offer and meet their needs, almost like a public service”, underlines Julie Morand, co-manager, with Lydia Lacour, of La Rencontre. The duo, who have worked in publishing and in the library, will notably offer stationery items, a beautiful youth and parenting section or even so-called “easy to read” books for people with reading difficulties.
Already a metro effect
In the north of the city, in the priority district of Maurepas, the cooperative bookstore L’Astrolabe did not wait to move into its final premises to organize literary cafés, meetings and writing workshops. Housed since April in the former post office of the Gast shopping center, doomed to destruction, it will settle in early 2023 a few steps away, in new premises which will house a training space and shared offices. “The arrival of the new metro line in September had a positive effect on turnover, it’s very promising”, observes Simon Pinel, who is by no means a neophyte since he co-founded in 2009 editions Rennes Critic and worked for more than ten years in the bookstore of the same name, like his current accomplice, Xavier Dollo.
More than a bookstore, L’Astrolabe is a book cooperative integrating Argyll, a publishing house oriented towards the literature of the imagination, as well as an incubator for literary projects. In the popular district of Blosne, L’Établi des mots, launched in 2020, has also relied on the cooperative model. “It will take shares in our structure and vice versa, rejoices Simon Pinel. It could be interesting to pool our costs with other bookstores on author signings, fairs or events. Rennes is a city that densifies enormously, everyone can find their place.”
However, the offer is now “largely sufficient”, according to Marie-Cécile Grimault. “We must not forget that the editorial world of Rennes is also very rich with young structures such as Les éditions du commun, Argyll or Panthera. These are professionals who exchange a lot, all this creates a very promising emulation for the economy of book,” she says.