“We realized that the volume of orders exceeded the capacity of our small premises and that we needed to expand. » Marc Bordier is, since October 2020, the president of the Arthaud bookshop in Grenoble and the co-founder, in September 20201, of the online bookstore Lireka whose headquarters are also in Grenoble. Until now, Lireka had premises of 130 m2, located next to the Arthaud bookshop, at 16, rue Jean-Jacques-Rousseau. From now on, it is installed in a warehouse of 400 m2 located at 115, rue des Alliés, in Grenoble. “We started looking for a location in the fall and we signed the lease in December,” says Marc Bordier.
The company Lireka, which operates 24 hours a day, seven days a week, had achieved a turnover (turnover) of €3.1 million in 2021. In 2022, it aims to develop turnover to €5 million, equivalent to that of the Arthaud bookshop.
Double the number of orders per day
“We receive more than 300 orders every day, and we plan to double that number by the end of the year”continues Marc Bordier. France weighs only 20% of turnover. We play on the complementarity between the physical bookstore intended for local customers and Lireka which is aimed at customers abroad (United States, Canada, Great Britain, Spain, Germany, New Zealand, South Africa, Israel , etc.). »
The books offered for sale are mainly in French. “We are not very present on books in foreign languages, but it is part of our development projects, to constitute a real offer in this area. » On the other hand, Lireka does not bet on digital books, believing that “the French-speaking digital book market has never really taken off”.
Seven people to recruit
The development of the company is reflected in an increase in the number of references in stock: “We are going to go from 80,000 to 100,000. This is what we announced in 2020 when we took over the Arthaud bookstore. At the time, the bookstore had 60,000 references. » It should be noted that the new warehouse will also house the stocks of the Arthaud bookshop, even if most of these stocks are on the shelves of the bookstore. “We have 220,000 volumes. On average, this represents three volumes per reference. For the most requested titles, we have twenty or even fifty copies in stock and for others only one unit. »
Lireka currently employs twelve people (eight in Grenoble and four in Paris). “Today, we have ten people working in the new warehouse, six from Lireka and four from the Arthaud bookstore, says Marc Bordier. We plan to recruit, by the end of the year, seven additional people, order pickers and delivery drivers. We work with the Pôle Emploi de la Bruyère branch in Grenoble. »
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