All right, so I'm in risk-a-roo this morning.
I'm a bit late.
Sorry, guys.
I have to go to the post office so I could get put some money in to pay for risk-a-roo this week.
So we've had another complaint about the price of the books in the shop.
£3.50 is too expensive for a book.
So Daniel spoke to the lady and they were nice for nappies.
It wasn't as bad as the other woman.
I told her to shut down because she'd come back in.
She said the reason the books are £3.50 is because they go to loads of pack of nappies.
So if an avid reader buys two books a week off us, £7, they're on half price at the moment and that's fine.
Then that goes to two packs of nappies that month or the following month when we cash it up.
And that's two separate families that's helped by a pack of nappies for free by a reader.
Okay, now we do the same with the media.
The DVDs don't have no trouble with the DVDs a pound or more.
We actually sell quite a lot of the box sets which we bundle together.
If they don't come in a box set and we like, oh well so and so got you know this version of whatever and my version and we put them all together.
You know like we had the Alien and the Predator series.
We pull them from different shops and we put them up for £15 and they flew out.
So our DVD customers support us very well.
Music, yes, people support us very well with the music.
And what's up with the weather down here?
It's not like that.
It's not like that in Blackwood.
It's blue skies.
Carl said this morning it's misty.
I was like, because he's from Rogerstone, I was like, that's not Carl.
We're about mist.
It's dreadful down here.
Proper overcast.
Yeah, so the CDs, the records, all goes towards CDs.
Now from books alone, because I added up, at the end of the month I go through the books because we write down every single sale we do.
Everything we give out for free is all in our order tracker.
That's like a diary of what we've sold or what's gone on throughout the day.
In each shop.
Like, oh I've got one.
I don't know where it is.
I'm sure the Pontypool's got to just pick one up from them.
They've had a new one.
So she said, well I can get ten bucks for a pound in the shop.
What charity shop is selling Blackwood?
They're selling ten books for a pound.
Because they need to go on a how to fundraise course.
Because they don't know what they're doing if they're selling novels ten for a pound.
Who reads more than ten novels in a week anyway?
I have got some mothers who are avid readers.
I got some mothers that actually do TikToks on the books they read.
They do like an online book club and they don't get through ten a week.
I went to university with one of our mothers that used to sit there knitting with a book on her lap and still answering questions in the university.
And I used to think, I wonder if you're doing all of that?
And she'd go through nearly two bucks a day.
So if you're buying more than ten books a week then you're selling them on.
Or you're book hoarding.
I don't know, you're propping things up with them.
I don't know.
Who buys more than ten books a week?
Who's going home at twenty, thirty bucks a week for three quid?
So we have decided that we're gonna ask people, specifically in our Blackwood shop, to pay three pound fifty for a book.
That might not be for you.
You might be able to get the same books somewhere else cheaper.
And that's absolutely fine because we're asking UK readers to shop with us.
Okay, we've marketed it to do that.
Now this month alone I have been able to buy an extra thirty seven packs of nappies at three pound odd.
Just from the book sales alone in Blackwood from April.
That's a lot of books.
Okay, now we're not swamped with books because I was talking to another charter yesterday that is struggling to sell their books.
I said you can copy our marketing if you want.
Well we've done, you know, it supplies, you know, a pack of nappies or whatever they're gonna do.
Whatever they're gonna supply from that.
So we're not swamped with books, right?
Like I know what's in Brynmawr, I know what's in Pontypool, I know what's in Miss Garoo, I know what's in Blackwood and I know what's in the donation centre.
Okay, we're not swamped with books.
So any other charity that is worried about getting swamped with books because you put your price up, you're not gonna be.
Because book readers will always buy books.
The book community will always buy book.
The record community will always buy records.
Okay, my thing is I never put a price on music.
So if I walk into any charity shop, a shop anywhere and there is a CD with one song on that I absolutely love, I don't care if I pay £25, £30 for it.
Okay, because one thing I never do is I never put a price on music and I've always done that with Daniel since he was a child.
Anything musical, because he showed an interest in music and he self taught on the piano, he's amazing on the piano.
I never put a price on music.
So anything.
This musical, if Daniel wanted it, he would have it.
And it's the same with me.
If I go out and I see something or I see a guitar or I see, I mean I bought a harp.
I've not chance to learn to play it yet, but I bought a harp.
I've always wanted to learn to play the harp.
If I see something that's music related, then I don't put a price on it.
And to be honest, the book community don't put a price on their books either because they know how valuable they are.
You know, I've still got books from when Daniel was a child that are perfect condition because he always looked after him because that's another thing Dan like was books, you know.
So our books are going really well and actually children's books fly out in Blackwood shop.
They're 50p to a pound depending on where they are and they fly out.
So that's Blackwood alone.
We've been able to buy 37 packs of nappies more than our allocated amount that I buy every month.
So those 37 will be distributed around the other shops.
Now I'd like to push them up a bit more in Pontypool which I think the guys are.
They've got a poster there.
They're doing their best.
But we got a lot of other book shops in Pontypool at doing cheaper.
So I'm aware of that.
Brynmawr is trying, you know, they are trying.
Risca, we've sold one or two.
But I would like to personally thank the book community for purchasing the books from us.
And I would like to go down the route of doing a Jayne's Baby Bank book award that we can get stickers put on books printed on the books.
So if anybody knows how to initiate that or who I've got a contact for that then I would appreciate that.
If you could contact me and let me know the details because you know I haven't got a lot of time to research stuff.
But it would be nice for our mothers, our readers, you know, our followers and all us readers to do a book.
A book award, you know.
That'd be fab.
Like they used to do the Richard and Judy ones, remember?
Be nice.
Be nice to do it.
And we promote reading because, you know, a lot of people they're not doing dyslexia tests now in schools.
So a lot of people aren't getting diagnosed until they go to university.
Or they're having to pay privately.
So we promote reading as much as we can.
That's why when we have an event we always give out children's books for free.
So I want to say a massive thank you again to everybody who buys the books off us.
We know they're dearer than the other charity shops.
And not all our books are £3.50.
Some are dearer, as you know.
If it's a collectible book it'll be up £10, £15.
And thank you very much for the people buying those.
Or sometimes, if it's been read quite a few times and the cover's a bit worn, obviously we put it down to £50 or a pound.
But the majority of the the novels which are good selling titles, like Lee Childs is one of the authors.
Wilbur Smith always sells well.
£3.50.
And our followers are more than happy to pay for that.
And thank you very much.
I try and keep you updated how many nappies we get a month.
But 37, that's 37 families extra in South East Wales because it'll be distributed among the shops on top of their allocation for the month.
Extra families will receive nappies.
So that's just amazing in there.
So thank you very much to all our book readers.
