Beloved Limerick bookseller braces for Christmas rush

O'Mahony's Booksellers in Limerick City reopens after six weeks of pandemic lockdown.

A staff member at O'Mahony's Booksellers in Limerick City readies the shop for reopening ahead of Christmas. Picture: O'Mahoney's Booksellers

With books traditionally a last-minute Christmas gift, early December is usually quiet for O'Mahony's Booksellers in Limerick City.

Normally, the last five days before Christmas are the massive sales days for the well-known family bookshop on O’Connell St, said the manager, Colette Cotter.

However, that looks set to change this year as the shop reopens after six weeks of pandemic lockdown.

"The five days before Christmas are our busiest days, usually, but we can’t take that same number all at one this year," Ms Cotter said.

"That’ll be the challenge: To get those people in earlier. That business from the last five days can't go online, because it wouldn’t be delivered in time for Christmas," Ms Cotter said. 

"Certain people always shop last minute, of course, but I do think people this year will be more conscious of the restrictions and space things out a bit."

More people are buying early, and online traffic has been strong, she said, adding that they are "inundated with orders".

Ahead of the bookshop's reopening, this week, staff spent the weekend sorting out the shop and pricing new stock.

"Obviously, we're coming into the busiest time of the year and, because a lot of publishing was postponed, the volume and range of books this year is unheard of; it's absolutely huge," Ms Cotter said.

"It's always a struggle to fit the volume of new titles published, but this year it's even worse, because there are twice as many books published, due to the fact that a lot of them were postponed." 

The shop is expecting the coming week to be extremely busy.

"We've been very busy, every day, with collections," Ms Cotter said. 

"I was very surprised. I initially thought we’d have one or two people a day. We, literally, had a queue of people every day to collect pre-orders. 

"Last Thursday, we turned away, I’d say, maybe 20 people, who couldn't understand why we couldn't let them in to browse. 

"We were saying to them, 'We can’t, we’d love to let ye in, but we can't yet'," she said.

The shop is expecting an increase in more thoughtful gifting this year, she added.