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May 7th, 2008

Former SPCK shops: Church Times letters / Shops withdrawn from auction

Church Times Letters

This week’s Church Times has several letters that relate to my news item from last week’s paper, ‘Former SPCK shops to be auctioned‘. An extract from the letter from Mrs Margery Roberts about the Westminster premises (click through for the whole thing):

This bookshop is leased by the Society of the Faith to the SPCK. Some months ago, we were asked to consider an assignment of that lease to St Stephen the Great (SSG). We made considerable efforts to obtain appropriate and satisfactory information about SSG’s finances and management structure, but, in the end, our trustees had to consider the proposed assignment without any reassuring material. They turned down the application, and the SPCK then decided to surrender the lease on the break date provided for in the lease, which happens to be this May.

Mrs Roberts says that my report ‘may have been misleading’, but I’m not quite sure what she means by this. I said in the report that “The Westminster bookshop at Faith House was closed on 11 April”, but I didn’t go into any further detail apart from a sentence or two about the rare books side of things.

Shops are withdrawn from auction

The four shops due to be auctioned by Colliers CRE in London on 13 May have been withdrawn from the auction (Thomas mentioned this in the comments last week). I understand that the shops have been withdrawn because there are covenants in the deeds which restrict the use of the buildings in some way. The shops, in Bradford, Canterbury, Exeter, and York are apparently still for sale.



This is a single Cartoon Blog entry, posted by Dave on Wednesday, May 7th, 2008 at 10:04 am.

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7 Responses to “Former SPCK shops: Church Times letters / Shops withdrawn from auction”


  1. Phelim McIntyre says:

    Thank you for letting us have the link for the letter from the Society of Faith. While I appreciate the authors’ difficulty in getting any form of facts from SSGCT their comment about Christian Bookshops being loss making is grossly inaccurate, as the accounts from SPCK, Wesley Owen and others show. Yes some work at a loss, but others make a poffit. I have worked in two that did, one SPCK, one other. I will be writing to the Church Times about the letter.

    May 7th, 2008 at 11:21 am
  2. Newshound says:

    According to the Colliers CRE site the Canterbury property appears to still be in the auction next Tuesday and is advertised as freehold with vacant possession! Does this mean there is no restrictive covenant on this property impeeding change of use?

    May 7th, 2008 at 1:24 pm
  3. Dave says:

    All four are still on the Colliers CRE website at the time of writing. I have been told that all four have been withdrawn from next week’s sale.

    May 7th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
  4. MQ says:

    Your original report was only misleading in that it did not make clear that the Westminster shop’s closure was not an SSG decision but effectively one made by the Society of Faith. The tentative phrase “may have been misleading” is about right, though, as it’s not a serious misrepresentation of the facts, but just open to misinterpretation.

    May 7th, 2008 at 4:03 pm
  5. veritas says:

    When I first read the Robert’s letter last week I was incensed but then I read it again. I’m still incenced about the last paragraph. She does, however, say that the Society of the Faith asked the SPCK to consider whether it was okay to lease the shop the SSG. SPCK did not assent because SSG could not provide “any reassuring material” regarding their finances. We should salute SPCK for not landing the Society of the Faith with SSG. SSG must be in a terrible financial and administrative mess.

    Would still like an apology from SPCK for landing former and present workers (especially those which could be profitable) with what can only be called The Bumbling Brewers.

    May 7th, 2008 at 6:45 pm
  6. Valiant for Truth says:

    Comment from SPCK re the attempted sale of the shops in today’s “Church Times”.

    May 9th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
  7. UTB says:

    Heads up all, The Lincoln shop - which just the other week was completely emptied of stock! and that the Brewers had told the Lincoln Echo, amongst others, was closing/closed etc, and that they are advertising the lease on - now has a handwritten sign in the door saying the shop will shortly be reopening and they are advertising for a manager! info to be obtained from Lincoln@thirdspace etc etc. One continues to wonder is the use of thirdspace an attempt to move away from the acknowledgement of who they are, and is it actually legal - Normally (as I understand it though I may be wrong in this)businesses trading as something other than their registered names are required to have a notice up stating who they are actually are owned by.
    The shop by the way still says SPCK Bookshop above it and all around!
    Interesting is it not!!

    May 10th, 2008 at 10:48 am

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