18 December 2012 Let’s choose magical bookshops

Exceptional bookshops and magical places with a soul can be found in every part of Poland. Let’s choose this most exceptional one! On the 13th of December – Bookseller’s Day – the second edition of the Most Beautiful Bookshops contest organised by lubimyczytac.pl and Ogólnopolski System Dystrybucji Wydawnictw Azymut Sp. z o.o. (Polish Nationwide Publication Distribution System) commenced. Among the 12 nominated bookshops two are from Krakow: Bona and Czuły Barbarzyńca in Krakow. Votes for the contest can be submitted till the 9th of January 2013. Please vote!

The organisers of the campaign want to show the potential that is hidden in independent bookselling initiatives. Their aim is also to indicate that it is worth investing in private bookshops as an alternative to huge bookselling networks and to show readers and bookshop customers that there are plenty of exceptional and unique places for bookworms in Poland. It is, therefore, necessary to talk and write about them and, most importantly, to visit them regularly.

’During the selection of bookshops taking part in the contest, we used the following criteria: the modern innovative design of a bookshop, an interesting idea to combine a bookshop with other forms of activity (e.g. bookshop-cum-café, bookshop-cum-gallery), the planning and implementation of activities going beyond the commercial sphere (author’s evenings, exhibition openings, bookcrossing, concerts, workshops for children and parents, meetings for schoolchildren, students etc.), or the introduction and use of modern tools and technologies (e-bookshop, Homer programme, e-readers and e-books),’ says Alicja Wojnarowska from Azymut. ‘A further stage of promotion of these exceptional places is the release of a calendar for the year 2013, which will also be a prize in our contest.

Which of the 12 bookshops presented on the web page of the campaign will win the title of Most Beautiful Bookshop? This depends on the results of one month’s voting in which users of lubimyczytac.pl will take part. In order to help them to make a choice, we will present the nominated bookshops successively at lubimyczytac.pl twice a week. The book which gathers the largest number of votes will not only receive the title of Most Beautiful Bookshop, but also an advertisement at lubimyczytac.pl, a promotional article in the Twoja Księgarnia magazine and calendars with the most beautiful bookshops for the year 2013.
In the first edition of the contest over 10,000 votes were submitted, and the prestigious title of the most beautiful bookshop went to Tajne Komplety from Wrocław.


Ogólnopolski System Dystrybucji Wydawnictw Azymut Sp. z o. o.
is the largest Polish company engaged in the wholesaling of books and providing distribution & logistic services on the Polish publishing and bookshop market. The company was established in May 1999 at the initiative of Grupa Wydawnicza PWN.

Lubimyczytać.pl – in spite of the short period of its existence (it was established at the end of 2010), it is the largest and most influential Polish social networking service devoted to books. Every month it is visited by almost 1.5 million unique users who discuss and comment on the latest publications and events in the world of books, strike up friendships, scan the huge collection of books and add selected items to their electronic libraries, write reviews, follow information about new releases and their favourite authors and, most importantly, contrary to the announcements of the reading crisis in Poland, …devour and buy books.