What's Happening With National Book Store?

Rumors about National Book Store’s demise have been greatly exaggerated, to paraphrase that oft-repeated quote from Mark Twain. The company has gone through multiple upheavals—wars, revolutions, natural disasters, and changes in customer behaviors, among many other challenges—but perhaps none tested the mettle of the 80-plus-year-old company more than the pandemic. 

“It was devastating,” Adrian Ramos, current president of National Book Store tells Esquire Philippines during that period. “We were hit on multiple fronts.”

First, most of their stores are in malls, and, of course, during the most severe months of the pandemic, foot traffic was virtually non-existent.

Second, the company’s biggest customer base is tied to students and school-related items, and without face-to-face schooling, there was simply no demand for their merchandise.

And third, so many Filipinos were hit economically during the darkest days of the pandemic. In short, there was a drastic decline in people who needed what National Book Store was selling, and many of those who did need them simply could not afford them.

“So, all those factors and, of course, a few others, all contributed to devastating our business,” Ramos admits. 

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To put it in concrete terms, Ramos says they closed down a total of 19 stores over the last three years. However, he is quick to point out that only eight of those closures were a direct result of the pandemic. The rest were due to other causes, such as store realignments or site redevelopments.

However, in the same period, National Book Store opened 13 new stores, the latest being at the fairly new Robinsons La Union in San Fernando.

So to hear Ramos talk about where National Book Store is now, it seems the dark days are behind them, and the company is on track to full recovery. How exactly did they do it?

National Book Store in Shangri-La Plaza Mall

Photo by National Book Store.

81 years of National Book Store

But first, a bit of a backgrounder. National Book Store was founded in 1942 by Jose and Socorro Ramos, which would mean it is celebrating 81 years this year. It has since become the country’s largest retail chain of bookstores and school and office supplies. For many years, Socorro Ramos, or Nanay Coring to her family and close friends, managed NBS herself, until she turned the reins over to her son Alfredo Ramos. However, Alfredo passed away in November 2022, and his son, Adrian, stepped up to become president of the company in January this year.

Adrian Ramos had been working for the company, as well as in other businesses of the Ramos family, for years. He says he prefers to be “behind the scenes.”

“But during the pandemic, I did have to sort of take on a more leadership role,” he says. “My dad hadn't been 100 percent for a while. Like a lot of older people, the pandemic wasn't too good for them.”

Ramos says it helped that their mall partners were supportive in terms of space rental payments for the duration of the pandemic-related lockdowns. The company had little choice but to weather the storm.

Photo by National Book Store.

It was around this time that unsavory news started spreading about how NBS was doing, with the worst posts on social media spreading lies about the real state of the company. Like any other business during that time, NBS was on survival mode but far from going anywhere. 

“It was all about giving the stores a chance to recover when things started to come back,” Ramos says. “Of course, we were keeping an eye out also on evaluating performance, store to store. Eventually, as more and more information (about the pandemic) came through, things started to go back to normal."

The worst period was from the start of the lockdown, in March 2020, until the middle of last year. But Ramos says things have started to pick up after school resumed in July and August 2022. It wasn’t much—certainly not at the same levels pre-pandemic—but it was an improvement at least.

“That threw us a bit of a lifeline, when students started coming back to school last year,” Ramos says. “In lots of ways, it was so difficult, and yet I am so proud of what us as National Bookstore and our team—and I consider everybody in the National Bookstore family—were able to achieve in keeping things together.” 

Where NBS is now

This year, Ramos says, is the first full back-to-school season in nearly four years.

“Having said that, all of it is just part of the ordinary course of retail business,” he says. “We evaluate store performance as well as new opportunities for openings.”

This strategy has resulted in the company arriving at the optimum size and configuration of their stores. An example is the new outlet at Shangri-La Plaza Mall, where we are conducting the interview. Ramos says it’s a bit smaller than the old store, but that’s part of the effect of changes in the retail landscape in this area of the city; there are other malls in close proximity to this branch—including SM Megamall, Podium, Robinsons Galleria, and Ayala Mall the 30th, and Estancia.

Photo by National Book Store.

As of early August, there are a total of 238 NBS branches nationwide, all of which are company owned. Six more are in the pipeline and are scheduled to open before the end of 2023. A few years ago, there were discussions to explore franchising NBS stores as a path to growth. In 2018, the company announced plans to offer its smaller retail format, NBS Express, which mostly offers school and office supplies with books only accounting for 10 percent of the inventory, for franchising. These Express stores are smaller in size, usually around 200 square meters versus the full-store formats of NBS branches found in malls that measure up to 400 square meters, and are meant to carry the company’s bestselling items. Those franchise plans were halted by the pandemic, although Ramos says they might revisit that idea in the near future.

“Where we are now, really, is we are rediscovering our roots,” he says. “We’re had to become leaner and more efficient and be more entrepreneurial again because the world has changed so much. 

“A lot of it goes back to things Lola would say before,” he adds, referring to his grandmother Nanay Coring, who is celebrating her 100th birthday in September. 

“I saw a video that she taped in 1998, and she talked about, how, number one, when she was in the store, she would talk to everybody and try to figure out what (customers) want to buy. She was always about making sure to give customers the best value possible, and to give them the most efficient shopping experience possible. 

“That's what we've attempted to rediscover and re-replicate in our store,” he adds.

NBS President Adrian Ramos

Photo by National Book Store.

Retail has obviously been disrupted by e-commerce in recent years, and, in that respect, NBS hasn’t exactly been left behind. Ramos reveals that the company’s e-commerce business is doing revenues almost equal to that of a large-sized physical branch. 

NBS is also keen to keep its current 70-30 split between school and office supplies and books, although a sister unit, Anvil Publishing, is still leading the charge in promoting Filipino voices in local publishing.

“On the school supply side, I think at the end of the day, we still need to be what we always have been in terms of what we mean to parents and students going back to school or being in school, which is complete value for money and assurance of quality and accessibility,” Ramos says. “During the pandemic, admittedly, when we were in survival mode, we had to make choices about where to focus our resources on. It was only after things started opening up again that we started reinvesting and building up our books. I think a lot of feedback we're getting from customers is that they can clearly see that the selection of books is a lot better now than it was about a year ago. 

“Coming from where we came from, we have to be disciplined in our approach to the rebuild,” he adds. “We're being a little bit more hyper-focused on the kind of books that we're bringing in. We're trying to find alternative sources for books to make them more affordable for Filipino customers.

“So this is not a sprint for us. It's a marathon. I'm so optimistic for the future of National Book Store and its place with Filipino families."