WH Smith has responded to criticism from the The British Guild of Travel Writers about its controversial decision to make Penguin its sole supplier of travel guides saying that its initial research had shown that giving a wider range of guidebooks made it “difficult to shop” for customers.

In a letter to Guild chairman Melissa Shales, WH Smith CEO Kate Swann played down the exclusive deal as “a trial” and said that she intended to now “review customer research, market data and feedback”.

Ms Shales said the letter did not mention Penguin, was very general and left both the present situation and WH Smith’s future plans unclear. She was relieved to hear however that the deal was “only a trial”.

Time for a rethink

“In the face of obvious public disapproval of this discriminatory sales strategy, I hope WH Smith will now rethink and provide travellers a proper range of carefully targeted guidebooks,” she added.

The move by WH Smith to stock only Penguin guides at its 265 airport and travel outlets – removing other publishers such as Frommer, Berlitz, Lonely Planet, Time Out, Michelin, Bradt etc from the shelves – has prompted widespread criticism from the travel industry, book publishers and consumers alike.

Labour MP Chris Mullin is the latest to join the criticism by writing to the Office of Fair Trading (OFT): “I put it to you that this seems to me to be a clear abuse – the latest of many – of WH Smiths’ near monopoly position,” he said.

Face off or face out?

Ms Swann said in her letter that the latest changes to the ranges WH Smith previously stocked were due to the fact that its travel outlets were “physically small” and that they planned to have more books displayed “face out”.

“WH Smith’s display strategy is entirely up to them,” responded the Guild’s Melissa Shales. “But face in or face out, it still does not explain why it appears to be choosing only to stock Penguin guides.”

Ms Swann said WH Smith’s policy had been influenced by a 21% decline in the travel guide market this financial year and that WH Smith only had a 5% share of this.

However guidebook sales were down in line with the general drop in traveller volumes due to the recession, said Ms Shales.

“We should all be working together to bring numbers back up. Whether theirs is a small segment of the market or not, it is a key issue for consumer choice at major travel gateways such as Heathrow and Gatwick airports,” she added.

WH Smith only bookseller at seven airports

The BGTW also received a letter from the BAA’s new commercial director John Holland-Kaye who said that travel books were “particularly relevant to BAA”. He went on to explain that WH Smith does not have a monopoly deal but a series of separate contracts with the different airports which effectively add up to exclusive deals with them all.

“Although we do not get involved in range selection, we have discussed this issue with WH Smith. They are planning to evaluate customer feedback and sales over the summer period, and if there is a detrimental impact to the measures mentioned above they will take the appropriate action to address the situation,” he said.

“The BGTW would like to know exactly how WH Smith and BAA intend to monitor this customer satisfaction about its reduced offer of exclusively Penguin imprint travel guides and look forward to receiving empirically provable results,” said Ms Shales.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION (& copies of letters) PLEASE CONTACT...

The British Guild of Travel Writers (BGTW): Press & PR Co-ordinator Sarah Monaghan This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

The British Guild of Travel Writers, founded in 1960, is the premier professional association for bonafide journalists, editors, photographers, and radio and film broadcasters working in the travel field. www.bgtw.org