Knihobot also operates brick-and-mortar shops and pick up places, as this one in Prague. Photo by Filip Noubel. Ued with permission.

A Czech company has revolutionized the selling of secondhand books and is now expanding across Europe.

The Czech Republic remains a country with high reading rates, according to a recent survey conducted within the European Union in 2022: 65 percent of Czechs read anywhere between five to over ten books per year, while the average for the EU is just above 52 percent.

This perhaps explains why not only new books but also secondhand books are highly popular. This is partially due to historical reasons: When then-Czechoslovakia was part of the Soviet Bloc from 1948 until the fall of communism in 1989, officials censored literature and publications, banning foreign books and literature seen as “countercultural.” During this period, secondhand bookstores, known as antikvariát in Czech, often served as spaces to find (often under the counter) books no longer published, or officially censored, as well as foreign editions providing an alternative to what the government deemed ideologically appropriate.

Another reason is the overlapping of two social changes: environmental awareness among younger generations, and the increased digitalization of commerce, particularly after the traumatic experience of the COVID-19 pandemic for both consumers and business owners.

The combination of those social and cultural changes might explain how a Czech secondhand bookstore, Knihobot, took Central Europe by storm. It is now expanding to Western Europe and becoming one of the most successful business innovation stories in the Czech Republic in recent years.

Knihobot is a Czech name made of the root “knih” referring to “book,” and the suffix bot comes from the Czech word ‘robot‘ that was adopted in many European languages.  The company was started in 2019, and today, according to the Czech Forbes magazine:

Knižní secondhand Knihobot letos zatím prodal tři miliony knih, o milion více než loni za stejnou dobu…V roce 2022 byl Knihobot podle žebříčku společnosti Deloitte patnáctou nejrychleji rostoucí firmou ve střední Evropě, v Česku pátou.

The secondhand book store Knihobot sold three million books so far this year, that is one million more than last year for the same period…In 2022, according to Deloitte's ranking, Knihobot was the 15th fastest growing company in Central Europe, and the 5th in the Czech Republic.

Global Voices interviewed Žaneta Kratochvílová, the marketing manager of Knihobot in Prague, over email to understand how the company made the purchase of secondhand books more user-friendly. As she explains:

Žaneta Kratochvílová, photo used with permission.

Vlastně vznikla přímo v antikvariátu. Zakladatel Knihobotu Dominik Gazdoš totiž ve svém rodném Zlíně provozoval nejprve antikvariát. Většinu knih tam přijímal z pozůstalostí, a tehdy mu došlo, že třídit svou knihovnu by měli lidé už daleko dřív.

Tím, že knihy často leží roky v přeplněných knihovnách nebo krabicích, se ničí a zastarávají. A proto vymyslel službu, která vše potřebné udělá za vás. Jednou
z hlavních bariér pro lidi je právě ta spousta práce kolem prodeje. Knihy nafotit, domluvit se s někým ze zájemců, pak je zabalit, poslat atd. Lidé rádi pošlou knihy dál, jen s tím nechtějí mít moc starostí.

Knihobot dnes dokáže díky automatizovaným procesům přijmout a zpracovat
aktuálně na 30 tisíc knih denně a kolem 25 tisíc denně zase prodat. Knihy od vás zdarma vyzvedne, pak je nafotí, nacení, vystaví na webu a najde pro ně zájemce.

Pro zákazníka je to velmi pohodlné. A když máte dobrou službu, využijete digitální technologie a intenzivně pracujete, dokážete se prosadit všude.

In fact, the idea was born in a second-hand bookshop. The founder of Knihobot, Dominik Gazdoš, initially ran a second-hand bookshop in his native Zlín [an industrial city in the east of the country]. He collected most of the books from family estates, and realized, back then, that people should have sorted their libraries much earlier.

Since books often lie for years in overcrowded bookshelves or boxes, they get destroyed and become obsolete. That's why he invented a service that would do all you need in this situation. One of the main obstacles people face is the amount of work involved in selling books: Taking photos of them, making arrangements with people interested in buying them, then packing and sending them. People are usually happy to send books on, but they don't want to have to worry too much about the whole process before.

Thanks to automated processes, Knihobot can currently receive and process
30,000 books a day, and sell about 25,000 per day. The service picks up the books from you for free, then takes pictures of them, prices them, and puts them on the website to find interested readers.

It is very convenient for the customer. With good service, and the use of digital technologies and intensive work, you can really establish yourself anywhere.

As Kratochvílová explains, Knihobot now operates in nine countries: the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Austria, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, and Belgium. Part of Knihobot's success, according to her, is the lack of innovation among traditional business actors:

Německo i Rakousko patří k silně čtenářským zemím. V Německu je nákup knih z druhé ruky oblíbený i kvůli tomu, že knižní trh má zákonem danou cenu nových knih, takže naše služba je jedna z mála možností, jak si pořídit levnější čtení. Obecně Němci jsou na rozdíl od nás zvyklí hodně nakupovat na marketplaces. Konkurence online antikvariátů je tam tedy větší a struktura vybudovanější, ale všechno jsou to firmy, které jsou na trhu dlouho a stále mají ten stejný produkt – neinovují, nezaměřují se na zákaznickou zkušenost – to jsme přišli změnit. Právě zákaznickým servisem, rychlostí doručení i férovou částkou z prodeje knih dokážeme konkurenci předehnat.

Germany and Austria are countries with a strong readership. In Germany, buying second-hand books is popular because the book market has a legally set price for new books, so our service is one of the few options for buying cheaper reading materials. In general, Germans, unlike us Czechs, are used to buying a lot in marketplaces. The competition from online second-hand booksellers is therefore greater there, and the market is more established. But they are all companies that have been on the market for a long time and still have the same product — they do not innovate and do not focus on customer experience — we are here to change that. It is through customer service, speed of delivery and a fair amount of book sales that we can overtake the competition.

New factors: The growing importance of recycling, digital fatigue

Behavioral changes guided by growing environmental awareness also play a major role in reshaping the books market, including in the Czech Republic, which is beginning to feel the impacts of climate change. Recycling and upcycling are important values among younger generations, thus making secondhand bookstores a priority, as Kratochvílová points out.

Knihy z druhé ruky ale začínají být populární díky několika faktorům. Přichází mladá generace, které je blízká udržitelnost a ekologie. Lidé samozřejmě také sledují cenu. A když si mohou levněji koupit knihu, která vypadá jako nová, proč by to neudělali.

The popularity of second-hand books is due to several factors. A young generation is emerging that is concerned with sustainability and ecology. Of course, people also pay attention to prices. And if they can buy a book that looks like new for less, why wouldn't they?

Kratochvílová also notes that e-readers did not end the sale of paper books, and that people now require digital detox to enjoy their holidays. Indeed, reading immersion retreats are now a popular form of tourism, as this BBC article demonstrates:

[The] reading retreat [is] part of an evolving wave of holidays that put reading, not sunbathing or sightseeing, centre stage. No longer content with paperbacks by the pool, travellers are signing up for structured literary holidays that combine the ritual of reading with the pleasure of place.

Victim of its own success?

Asked about the benefits Knihobot brings to readers, Kratochvílová mentioned:

Knihy z druhé ruky už nejsou výsadou antikvariátů, ale díky naší službě si je může pořídit každý z pohodlí domova, jako na jakémkoliv klasickém e-shopu. Už se nemusí vydávat do zapadlých obchůdků a přehrabovat hromady knih. Stačí si otevřít naši nabídku, naklikat knihy do košíku a do druhého dne mohou být knihy u vás.

Second-hand books are no longer the prerogative of second-hand stores. Thanks to our service, everyone can buy them from the comfort of their home, like in any classic e-shop. They no longer have to go to remote shops and rummage through piles of books. All you need is to go to our website, add the books to your cart and they receive them home the next day.

But while finding the rare book at the tip of one's fingers does indeed save time and energy, the charm of “rummaging through piles of books” is also part of what makes the life of bookworms so special.