Mondadori Retail continues the plan to develop its network of bookstores across Italy from north to south, and kicks off a new training project for the network’s booksellers.

After the 10 bookstores inaugurated in the first half of the year, another 10 stores will open to the public by end 2021. The plan brings the offering of the most extensive network of bookstores in Italy even closer to readers, with the directly-managed medium-size stores located in the larger cities, and the franchised ones in the smaller populated areas.

Two new directly-managed Mondadori Bookstores will open over the next few months: the first in Lombardy, inside the Fiordaliso mall in Rozzano (Milan), which will be inaugurated on 11 November 2021, followed by a second opening in Emilia Romagna.

Eight new franchised Mondadori Bookstores and Mondadori Points are expected to open in the final part of the year in Emilia Romagna, Latium, Campania, Apulia, Calabria and Sicily.

Mondadori Retail also enhances the services dedicated to franchisees with the new training program called Percorsi. The new courses are meant to provide the over 500 affiliated booksellers with additional tools and guidance to enhance and increase their daily bookstore activities, through insights into the evolving landscape of the publishing world in recent years and the relationship between booksellers and readers in the digital age.

“We have built a training path to be alongside our affiliates in an even closer way, providing them with an opportunity for in-depth analysis and discussion that will help them nurture their relationship with readers even more. Bookstores are outposts of culture that can add value to the local area and its communities; today, they are turning more and more into vital gathering spots where people converge for the pleasure of discovering new stories. Our new openings bear further proof of their importance for the buoyancy of the sector, which is also driven by the dedication and hard work of booksellers throughout Italy, key figures in the promotion of reading in our Country”, says Carmine Perna, Managing Director of Mondadori Retail.

Percorsi is divided into four sessions covering several topics, from market scenarios to the enhancement of books and their assortment inside the store, from customer relations to exploring the synergies between the physical and digital world, with industry professionals taking the floor.

“The present and future of Bookstores” is the focal theme of the opening session, graced by the address from Prof. Paola Dubini from the Bocconi University. The publishing market in Italy is constantly evolving; the last 18 months, in particular, have marked a true watershed, with a few major aspects coming to the fore. The session will explore the dynamics of the sector, how to promote peculiarity in the local area, the bookseller role and the next steps to be taken.

The Percorsi cycle continues in November with the second session dedicated to “Assortment, catalogue, local area: building value for the customer“. Building an assortment is crucial to meet the needs of readers and to cover the local area: what are the pillars for building the right offer? How to enhance readers and the local area? What role do categories hold and how can choices be guided?

In 2022, Percorsi will continue with two training events that will address how to manage customers and their satisfaction and the new opportunities offered by cross-channel marketing, which will be followed by new training workshops next year.

Thursday 22 July sees the opening, in the heart of the city of Salerno, of a new Mondadori Bookstore, with a special opening event at 6 pm.

The Mondadori Bookstore di Via Porta Elina will be a point of reference for all book lovers, thanks to an extensive offer of books of all kinds and an exciting calendar of events featuring leading figures from the world of the arts and entertainment.

The guests expected at the opening ceremony include Antonia Willburger, the city councillor for Culture of the Municipality of Salerno, and the author Roberto De Luca.

“This project is the result of a desire to expand the presence of bookshops in the area of Salerno and Campania, giving citizens the possibility of finding what they’re looking for, and coming into contact with books and booksellers on a daily basis. In an increasingly digital age, it is really important to rediscover the pleasure of flicking through the pages and choosing what to read with the books in your hand, a stimulus also for exchange with booksellers and other readers. Thanks to the collaboration of Mondadori Store and my desire to launch this business venture, I aim to increasingly reinforce the relationship between the region of Campania and culture. It is an extra challenge for me, but I am confident that the cultural spirit of the city of Salerno will prove to be extremely positive,” announced Antonio Verderame, the businessman affiliated with the Mondadori Store.

The new bookstore, which covers and area of 140 square metres, features an offer of more than 10,000 volumes, curated by the experience of a team of five passionate booksellers who will welcome readers seven days a week with tips and suggestions from among the new releases, bestsellers and niche titles.

From fiction, non-fiction, miscellaneous titles and the classics, right up to cartoons: a significant selection is dedicated to manga, superheroes and graphic novels, and increasingly popular genre with the public.

There is also a dedicated area for children and young adults with the best educational games and illustrated books to stimulate the imagination of younger readers.

Great importance is also given to the local area, including local authors, and histories and guides on the city and the region, available also in English for international visitors and tourists.

And finally, of course, there will also be a range of the latest music releases, stationery products and gift ideas, gift boxes and gift cards.

All of the customers of the Mondadori Bookstore will also be able to make use of digital services, such as Pick Up Point, which enables customers to collect from the store books bought on Mondadoristore.it, selected from a catalogue of over 1 million titles; Prenota e ritira (Order and collect) with which readers can order online and pay and collect in the store; and Invia a casa (Home delivery) to have books ordered in the store delivered straight to your home.

This new opening takes to three the number of Mondadori Store outlets in the city of Salerno, where the bookstore chain is already present with shops in Corso Vittorio Emanuele, 56 and Via Posidonia, 95.

MONDADORI BOOKSTORE
Via Porta Elina 3, Salerno
Open: Mon – Sun 08.30 – 21.00
E-mail: mondadorisalernoportanova@gmail.com – 089 9762477
www.mondadoristore.it/negozi

Thursday 22 July sees the opening in Catania of a new Mondadori Bookstore. The opening event, which will take place on Wednesday 21 July at 7 pm, is expected to be attended by Salvo Pogliese, the Mayor of the City of Catania, and Barbara Mirabella, the City Councillor for Culture and Educational Policy of the Municipality of Catania. Also present for the ribbon cutting will be the Sicilian artists Vittorio Ribaudo, a painter of wood and of nature, and street artist Mikhail Albano, who, to mark the opening, will be showing some of their work in the new bookstore.

The Mondadori Bookstore in via D’Annunzio will be a point of reference for all book lovers with an extensive offer of books of all kinds, from bestsellers to niche titles, curated by the experience of a team of six passionate booksellers who will welcome readers seven days a week.

A space for cultural aggregation that will be animated by a calendar of events aimed at engaging the public, including meetings with local and national writers, protagonists from the world of the arts and entertainment.

“We are delighted to be able to launch this new project with a brand like Mondadori Store in the city where we grew up. This is also a young entrepreneurial adventure that began a few years ago when with my brother we made the decision to invest in this area, opening the first bookstore, together with Mondadori Store. Following the successful opening of sales outlets inside the Le Zagare and Katanè shopping malls, we are expanding the cultural offering in the heart of Catania: the new bookstore will be a place to live, meet people and will provide a stimulus for the entire community,” said Stefano Monica, the businessman affiliated with the Mondadori Store chain.

Covering a surface of 360 square metres on two floors, the Mondadori Bookstore will stock more than 50,000 books including fiction, non-fiction, miscellaneous titles and the classics, as well as a wide and curated selection of cartoons, from manga to superheroes and graphic novels. There is also a section dedicated to Sicily and local authors. A specific area is also dedicated to children and young adults, from educational games to illustrated books to stimulate young readers.

Visitors will also find a varied and high-quality assortment of stationery, gift boxes and gift cards. Meanwhile, the second floor of the bookstore has space that will be used to host literary and musical events.

All of the customers of the Mondadori Bookstore will also be able to make use of digital services, such as come Pick Up Point, which enables customers to collect from the store books bought on Mondadoristore.it, selected from a catalogue of over 1 million titles; Prenota e ritira (Order and collect) with which readers can order online and pay and collect in the store; and Invia a casa (Home delivery) to have books ordered in the store delivered straight to your home.

This new opening takes to four the number of Mondadori Store outlets in the city of Catania.

MONDADORI BOOKSTORE
Via Gabriele D’Annunzio 115, 95127, Catania
Open: Mon-Sun 09.00 – 20.30
E-mail: mondadoridannunzio@outlook.it – 095.2202569
www.mondadoristore.it/negozi
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Mondadori Retail, the company that manages Italy’s most extensive chain of bookstores, continues its development strategy with the opening of con 10 new sales outlets across the country.

The new Mondadori Bookstores – both directly managed and franchised – that will open in the coming months will be supported by a plan to strengthen the offer, digitization and the launch of a training programme for booksellers.

“In a year that has been characterised by great dynamism in the book sector, we think that it is a real priority to invest in both the development of physical stores and the enhancement of services,” declared Carmine Perna, chief executive of Mondadori Retail. “Preference will be given to medium-sized shops, managed directly in the larger towns and cities and as franchises in smaller centres, with the aim of responding to the cultural needs of the local communities with an offer the corresponds to the customer. We will also offer specific training to our booksellers and new digital tools to encourage and expand the relationship with readers across the country,” Perna concluded.

A new Mondadori Bookstore has opened in Milan, within Bicocca Village. This directly-managed shop will be a point of reference for book lovers with over 10,000 titles available, from fiction to non-fiction, classics and comics, a sector dedicated to kids and young adults, with films and toys, and s selection of quality stationery, gift boxes and gift cards.

Another new opening took place at the end of May in Pontecagnano (Salerno): where the nee Mondadori Bookstore will enhance the offer of the Centro Maximall with the best of Mondadori’s offer of culture and entertainment.

By the end of July other new Mondadori Bookstores will be opened in Portogruaro (Venice), in the Adriatico2shopping mall and in San Martino Buon Albergo (Verona), inside Le Corti Venete, to be followed in the autumn by another three directly-managed stores in central-north regions.

Also franchised openings will continue: following those in March and April in Cava de Tirreni, L’Aquila, Avella, Naples and Frascati, new affiliated booksellers will open another three Mondadori Bookstores in the centre and south of Italy before the end of the summer.

As well as reinforcing the shops, the Mondadori Retail strategy is focused on enhancing specific market segments, expanding the in-store assortment with the introduction of the Just Comics format: an in-store comics factory, to give more visibility to a publishing area that is meeting with increasing public interest.

Just Comics is already present in Milan with an entire floor dedicated to the segment in the Rizzoli Galleria book shop and the Mondadori Megastore in Piazza Duomo, in the Mondadori Bookstores in Arese, Padua, Bologna, and  both the Via Appia and Fiumicino stores in Rome, and with an extensive section in the main shops of the chain, as well as on www.mondadoristore.it. With a selection of over 10,000 comic and illustrated titles, that go from manga to graphic novels and superheroes, it will be a new point of reference of all comics fans and everyone who wants to discover a world full of stories.

Mondadori Retail has also launched an extensive training programme for booksellers, which aims to reinforce the skills of the teams in the directly-managed stores, by enhancing important aspects of the relationship with readers, from when they arrive in the shop until they make a purchase. For the franchise chain, a series of meetings will begin in the autumn aimed at providing booksellers and the entrepreneurs who have decided to affiliate with the chain with the tools and knowledge necessary to develop their skills.

Particular attention is also being given to digital services, which are increasingly central in the relationship with readers and the buying process, which have been designed around the needs of new consumers. The entire Mondadoristore.it catalogue – with over 1 million titles, including books in Italian and in original languages, school textbooks, eBooks, eReaders, films in DVD and Blu-ray, music of every kind, toys, gift ideas and stationery products – is accessible also through free multichannel services, selecting between the Pick Up Point, Prenota e Ritira (Order & Collect) and Invia a casa (Delivery) options.

There is also an expansion of the range of new cashless services, such as Scalapay, available from June, which enables customers of the online channel to pay by instalments, and a  pay by mail solution, which will be up and running by the end of the year, to pay remotely for purchases made in store.

The logistics area – essential to ensure an increasingly efficient service for both customers and booksellers – is also being upgraded, with the optimisation of the entire process – from orders to delivery– with the autumn introduction of dropshipping, an innovative distribution model that makes it possible to reduce delivery times.

Mondadori Store, Italy’s most extensive chain of bookshops, will expand its network of franchised stores with a plan of new openings that is mainly focused on the central and southern regions of the country.

Ten new stores will open this summer, increasing the unique offer – in Campania, Puglia, Lazio, Sicily and Marche – of books, reading recommendations, activities and events with personalities from the worlds of literature, music and entertainment that characterises Mondadori Store bookshops.

“In recent months our booksellers have been working energetically to ensure that Italian families continue to have access to our editorial offer, confirming, once again, the important socio-cultural role of bookshops.
Today, our commitment to sustaining and supporting the diffusion of book and reading is made even more concrete thanks to new entrepreneurs who have chosen to be part of the Mondadori Store network at a particularly important time for the country’s entire economic and social system,” declared  Carmine Perna, chief executive of Mondadori Retail.

In both large cities and small towns, the Mondadori Group company that manages the bookshop chain extensively covers the whole country and every year serves – between its stores and on the web site Mondadoristore.it – over 20 million customers.
The model focuses on the quality of the buying experience, multichannel services and events, with the needs of the customer-reader always at the centre.

So, the news from the Mondadori Store network includes, the opening in the coming days of the new Mondadori Bookstore del Vomero, in a new location in Naples: a large bookstore on three floors, in the heart of the Vomero district. The reopening of the store in Naples adds to the recently inaugurated store in Cava De’ Tirreni (Salerno) inside the Cavese shopping mall. July will see a new Mondadori Bookstore in Santa Maria Capua Vetere (Caserta) in the main street in the centre of the town, and a Mondadori Point in the historic centre of Angri (Salerno).

Another three shops will open in July in Puglia with new Mondadori Points in the centre of Gravina di Puglia (Bari) and Alberobello (Bari), and a new Mondadori Bookstore in the main street in the historic centre of Francavilla Fontana (Brindisi).

Other regions that have seen the opening of new franchised Mondadori Bookstores include: in Lazio, where there is now also a Mondadori Bookstore in the Boccea area of Rome; in Sicily, with located in the centre of the city on the seafront; in Marche with the opening of a Mondadori Bookstore in Fermo, in the pedestrian precinct of the city’s historic medieval centre.

Mondadori Store, Italy’s largest bookstore chain, has opened a new store at the Carrefour shopping mall in Limbiate, on the outskirts of Milan.

With its rich variety of editorial products, the new Mondadori Bookstore will be a reference point for all lovers of culture and entertainment.
The directly managed bookshop has an area of over 200 square metres with an assortment of 10,000 titles including fiction, non-fiction, classics, comics and a sector aimed at children and teenagers, with books and toys. Visitors will also find the latest music releases and a selection of the best stationery products, gift boxes and gift cards.

From large cities to smaller towns, the model of the Mondadori Group network of bookstores focuses on the quality of the shopping experience, multi-channel services and events, while always focusing on the needs of the customer-reader.

Customers can take advantage of all the Mondadori Store services, such as Pick Up Point, which allows you to pick up a book purchased on Mondadoristore.it free of charge at the point of sale, choosing from a catalogue of over 1 million titles; Order and collect, or the ability to order a book online and then collect and buy it in the store; Home delivery, to have a product ordered in the store delivered straight to your home.

From tomorrow a new Mondadori Bookstore will be open in Rome, at the AURA shopping mall, the large shopping hub opened in the Valle Aurelia area, just a short distance from the Vatican City.
With more than 15,000 titles on sale and an offer of events ranging from meetings with leading protagonists from the world of books and music to children’s workshops, the new Mondadori bookshop will be a point of reference for readers and visitors to the centre and place to discover a world of culture and emotions.

This new opening takes the number of outlets in the Mondadori Store network in the Rome area to 23, a level of coverage that confirms the Mondadori Group chain’s position as the most extensive bookshop chain in Italy, able, through its more than 600 stores, to serve over 20 million customers every year.

The new Mondadori Bookstore, located in a position close to the main entrance to the Aura shopping mall, is spread over an area of 300 square metres, where customers can find the latest book releases in fiction, non-fiction, classics and  graphic novels, an area for children and teenagers with books and toys, a sector for music and films, the best stationery products, gift boxes, and a corner dedicated to the Kobo e-reader.
The store also offer the possibility of accessing a catalogue of more than 7 million books available online at Mondadoristore.it, thanks to Pick up point services, where customers can pick up in the store titles that they buy online; Order and collect, where they can order online and pick up in store; or Home delivery, where products ordered in the store can be delivered straight to the customer’s address.

Inside the bookshop there is also a Mondadori Café, with seating for 35 customers, open all day, from breakfast time until the evening cocktail hour, with healthy gourmet products, and special attention to the needs of children.

Among the first events planned at the store will be a number of appointments for children between the ages of 4 and 10: on 28 and 29 April and 5 and 6 May, from 10 am to 12.30 pm and from 3 pm until 7 pm the Mondadori Bookstore will host two workshops run by professional educators who, using physical and musical expression techniques, will facilitate integration, familiarity between the participants and group training in teamwork.

The Mondadori Bookstore project was designed by Studio Kallipigia Architetti. Mondadori Café was developed in collaboration with Cibiamogroup.

Mondadori Retail, Italy’s most extensive network of book shops with 600 outlets. is aiming to grow further with a development plan for the opening of new Mondadori Bookstores across the country, and offering opportunities to become an affiliate of the  chain.

The business model that characterises the Mondadori Group’s is franchising. With over 550 affiliated outlets across Italy, Mondadori Retail offers a capillary coverage able to reach customers even in the smallest towns. The core assortment of books, is supported by a range of other products, such as music, films, stationery and toys, for an all-round cultural offer.

The Mondadori Retail affiliation proposal is aimed at entrepreneurs with a great passion for books and reading, and who want to become protagonists of the cultural life of their town and able to enhance the relationship with customers and the surrounding area.

“Our franchisees can rely on a prestigious brand, consolidated know-how and all of the experience of the leading bookstore group with a solid image built up over the years that is a reference point for culture and entertainment. Our bookstore development plan foresees the expansion of our presence to the most interesting locations, including the region of Puglia, with the aim of bringing our offer even closer to the public,” declared Leonardo Gazza, Mondadori Retail’s sales director for both directly managed and franchised stores.

Affiliates in Puglia will receive all-round support from Mondadori Retail, from the search for and selection of locations to the layout, the definition of the assortment and training, as well as a framework agreement with banks.

To this end, a collaboration arrangement for the region of Puglia has been organised with the Banca Popolare di Bari, which has very deep roots in the area in which Mondadori Retail wants to develop, in order to provide a tailor-made offer, and making use of all of the location-specific financing opportunities.

The Mondadori Retail affiliation proposal will be presented during four Open Days: on Wednesday 21 June in Altamura (c/o Hotel Fuori Le Mura​ – via Maestri del lavoro, 5); Thursday 22 June in Barletta (c/o BEST WESTERN Hotel dei Cavalieri – via Foggia, 40); Wednesday 28 June in Santa Maria al Bagno – Nardò (c/o Grand Hotel Riviera – CDSHotels – via E. Filiberto, 172-174); and Thursday 29 June in Brindisi (c/o Grande Albergo Internazionale – Viale Regina Margherita, 23.). The events will take place between 5 and 7 pm.

For information and bookings: roberta.sambinello@mondadori.it – www.mondadoriretail.com