Publications Distribution Cooperative (PDC) was set up in 1976 to distribute

radical Radical (from Latin: ', root) may refer to: Politics and ideology Politics *Classical radicalism, the Radical Movement that began in late 18th century Britain and spread to continental Europe and Latin America in the 19th century *Radical politics ...

socialist Socialism is an economic ideology, economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse Economic system, economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership. It describes ...

feminist Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideology, ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social gender equality, equality of the sexes. Feminism holds the position that modern soci ...

, green/

ecology Ecology () is the natural science of the relationships among living organisms and their Natural environment, environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community (ecology), community, ecosystem, and biosphere lev ...

and

community A community is a social unit (a group of people) with a shared socially-significant characteristic, such as place, set of norms, culture, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given g ...

publications in Britain to the

book A book is a structured presentation of recorded information, primarily verbal and graphical, through a medium. Originally physical, electronic books and audiobooks are now existent. Physical books are objects that contain printed material, ...

and newsagent trade.

History

Publications Distribution Cooperative catalogues 1979

In Britain, the 1970s was a time of change in publishing and book selling with “the development in a very short period of a new and substantial radical sector and of associated retail outlets”. PDC was integral to this change. The growth of new technologies in printing with

offset litho Offset printing is a common printing technique in which the inked image is transferred (or "offset") from a plate to a rubber blanket and then to the printing surface. When used in combination with the lithographic process, which is based on ...

phototypesetting Phototypesetting is a method of Typesetting, setting type which uses photography to make columns of Sort (typesetting), type on a scroll of photographic paper. It has been made obsolete by the popularity of the personal computer and desktop publ ...

and more, offered cheaper, easier and more accessible ways to produce publications in a political climate eager for debate. PDC provided the sales and distribution link between the book, magazine and pamphlet publishers and the new alternative, radical bookshops as well as the established book and newsagent trade. The existence and growth of the co-operative coincided with the launch of many new radical magazines and journals, including The

Leveller The Levellers were a political movement active during the English Civil War who were committed to popular sovereignty, extended suffrage, equality before the law and religious tolerance. The hallmark of Leveller thought was its populism, as sh ...

, Spare Rib, Libertarian Education,

Feminist Review ''Feminist Review'' is a triannual peer-reviewed academic journal with a focus on exploring gender in its multiple forms and interrelationships. The journal was established in 1979. It is published by SAGE Publishing and is edited by a collective. ...

and publishers Centerprise Books, Child Poverty Action Group, WRRC,

Zed Books Zed Books is a non-fiction publishing company based in London, UK. It was founded in 1977 under the name Zed Press by Roger van Zwanenberg. Zed publishes books for an international audience of both general and academic readers, covering areas ...

and more. This history was celebrated at an event in November 2022 at th
Barbican
'Quiet Revolutions: A Celebration of Radical Bookshop

where booksellers and publishers, both contemporary - Gay's the Word (bookshop), Gay's the Word
Newham Bookshop
Housmans, Roundtable Books, Th
Bookish Type
an
Five Leaves Bookshop
- and from 1970/80s - Centerprise, Freedom News, New Beacon,

Sisterwrite Sisterwrite was Britain's first feminist bookshop. The bookshop, which opened in 1978, was run as a collective. Sisterwrite was located at 190 Upper Street, in the Islington district of north London. Founding Mary Coghill and Kay Stirling invite ...

and Silvermoon - met for a bookfair and workshops/seminars. In the mid 1970s, after a series of meetings of publishers (the Radical Publications Group - Spare Rib magazine, The Leveller, Radical Science Journal,

Radical Philosophy ''Radical Philosophy'' is a triannual peer-reviewed academic journal of critical theory and philosophy. It was established in 1972 with the purpose of providing a forum for the theoretical work which was emerging in the wake of the radical movemen ...

and more).) and alternative booksellers ( Ken Worpole from Centerprise Bookshop and others), in 1975/76, a feasibility study on distribution was undertaken. As a result PDC was set up in autumn 1976 by an initial group of five people supported by representatives from radical publications and booksellers.

Structure

Based in

Clerkenwell Clerkenwell ( ) is an area of central London, England. Clerkenwell was an Civil Parish#Ancient parishes, ancient parish from the medieval period onwards, and now forms the south-western part of the London Borough of Islington. The St James's C ...

Workshops in London, PDC was set up as a worker co-operative that operated as a

collective A collective is a group of entities that share or are motivated by at least one common issue or interest or work together to achieve a common objective. Collectives can differ from cooperatives in that they are not necessarily focused upon an e ...

.. Initially constituted as a partnership, it was registered as an Industrial & Provident Society on 20 October 1977. In 1977 offices were opened in

Hebden Bridge Hebden Bridge is a market town in the Calderdale district of West Yorkshire, England. It is in the Upper Calder Valley, west of Halifax and 14 miles (21 km) north-east of Rochdale, at the confluence of the River Calder and the Hebden W ...

, West Yorkshire and later in

Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...

with a co-operative member based in

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands (county), West Midlands, within the wider West Midlands (region), West Midlands region, in England. It is the Lis ...

who serviced outlets in the

Midlands The Midlands is the central region of England, to the south of Northern England, to the north of southern England, to the east of Wales, and to the west of the North Sea. The Midlands comprises the ceremonial counties of Derbyshire, Herefor ...

. In 1979 a decision was made to set up a parallel co-operative, Scottish and Northern Books (S&N), based in

Manchester Manchester () is a city and the metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It had an estimated population of in . Greater Manchester is the third-most populous metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, with a population of 2.92&nbs ...

and

, to enable local staff to make decisions relevant to their work and the markets they served. S&N was registered as an Industrial & Provident Society on 5 September 1979. The original London-based PDC divided into two groups, Full Time Distribution, which would continue to distribute magazines throughout Britain, and Southern Distribution, which would sell books and pamphlets in London and the South

Distribution

At that time the distribution of magazines and periodicals through newsagents was controlled by a group of three wholesalers who would not take on radical titles. PDC worked to challenge this while building an alternative distribution network. The needs of the magazines, especially monthly publications with a growing audience like Spare Rib and The Leveller, demanded a fortnightly distribution run which ensured the magazines would be delivered regularly. This aggregation of magazine and book deliveries structured the work at PDC from the outset and included use of

Red Star Parcels Red Star Parcels was a railway-centric Registered mail, registered courier service owned and operated by British Rail. It used passenger trains for transporting parcels between passenger railway stations throughout the United Kingdom. Red Star ...

(rail) and alternative distributors like Suma Wholefoods as well as the

Royal Mail Royal Mail Group Limited, trading as Royal Mail, is a British postal service and courier company. It is owned by International Distribution Services. It operates the brands Royal Mail (letters and parcels) and Parcelforce Worldwide (parcels) ...

. PDC co-op members would deliver parcels, collect magazine returns and sell new titles to the bookshops on the fortnightly run. “PDC was a powerful catalyst for growth in the radical book trade, as radical bookshops, stalls, and groups running occasional events, could easily obtain a range of stock from one source, while publishers knew there would be a reliable market for their output”. Regular collective meetings were held to discuss and decide upon new titles as a growing range of publishers applied for a distribution deal. Many of the publishers, despite their commitment, were not professionals, and without publishing experience they often needed advice and support to make their publications acceptable to the book trade. One science journalist commented: "Until recently, there was no way that an author could hope to distribute a radical pamphlet, except by taking it to bookshops himself." As PDC established a network in bookshops, newsagents and non-traditional sales outlets and developed a regular pattern of fortnightly distribution deliveries and sales representation across the UK, and to some shops in Europe and the USA, it increased the sales of many political and alternative magazines. Previously there had been no organised means of distribution, but now publishing groups could focus on writing and production, although not all magazines were impressed by the work of PDC. PDC created and developed a profile in both the book and newsagent trades, and became known and respected as a distributor of radical, feminist, ecology and left-of-centre publications It enabled bookshops to obtain a wide range of publications from one source. “PDC was really important. Without the distribution network there were many publications, newspapers, leaflets etc that we would not have been able to circulate. These were the days before social media and digital communication. The rise of alternative publishing, bookselling and distribution systems were about taking control of the whole process, not being at the mercy of straight publishers, etc, deciding what could and couldn't be produced and shared. It was about seizing political power, the ability to be self-determining and creating a radical new culture.” As PDC grew it was listed in book trade, library directories and listings. This was an important trade recognition and a link to enable wider access and distribution of the books and magazines. In a pre-internet world getting the word out on new publications was far slower and more arduous. PDC was also credited in citations in academic books and journals, another step in the acknowledgement of the role PDC played. In 1980 it was described as "the most vital internal element in the growth of the alternative book trade in Britain in the 1970s". When PDC stopped trading at the end of 1983 it left a huge gap for publishers and bookshops.

Finance

PDC was limited by a lack of business capital and was started using loans from supporters and a lot of unpaid labour. It secured crucial grant support from the

Gulbenkian Foundation The Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation (), commonly referred to simply as the Gulbenkian Foundation, is a Portuguese institution dedicated to the promotion of the arts, philanthropy, science, and education. One of the wealthiest charitable founda ...

and the Rowntree Trust and grew to employ 15 people. In 1978/79 the wages of eleven members of the collective were paid by the

Manpower Services Commission The Manpower Services Commission (MSC) was a non-departmental public body of the Department of Employment in the United Kingdom created by Edward Heath's Conservative Government on 1 January 1974 under the terms of the Employment and Training ...

(MSC) through its Job Creation Programme. Support was not continued into a second year when

Margaret Thatcher Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher (; 13 October 19258 April 2013), was a British stateswoman who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of th ...

and a Conservative government were elected in May 1979. PDC distributed a huge range of publications, supported an ever-growing market of outlets and had a significant impact on the political debates and culture of the time. Its eventual failure was a result of many factors. Providing a marketing and distribution service to so many diverse publications proved to be financially unviable. In a pre-computer world handling 300 publishers for distribution to 500 outlets was a huge task. In the end too few of the activities were financially profitable. The lack of capital investment and of business and financial skills exacerbated the problems.

Legacy

PDC London continued trading until late 1983, while S&N Books in Manchester and Edinburgh continued to trade until May 1986. The experience of PDC and S&N was fundamental to the creation of two new businesses that were started after PDC ceased trading �
Bookspeed
in Edinburgh an
Turnaround
in London – both of which are still working as distributors in 2022. It has also been argued that PDC has had a long-lasting cultural and political effect in enabling the wider distribution of radical ideas and literature than would otherwise have been the case. PDC was included and was part of the discussion on the radical booktrade in the 70s/80s, and now, held at th
Barbican
in November 2022.

Publications distributed by PDC and S&N

Magazines included:Book and magazines catalogues for publications distributed by PDC, Scottish & Northern Books, Full Time Distribution, Southern Distribution. Published approximately annually ''

Camerawork Cinematography () is the art of motion picture (and more recently, electronic video camera) photography. Cinematographers use a lens to focus reflected light from objects into a real image that is transferred to some image sensor or light-s ...

'', ''Community Action'', '' The Leveller'', '' Musics'',
Radical Statistics
', ''Red Rag,''
Release
',
Science for People
', '' Spare Rib'', ''Troops Out'', '' Undercurrents'',
Women’s Voice
' and many more. Book publishers included: Centerprise Books,

Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) is an organisation that advocates unilateral nuclear disarmament by the United Kingdom, international nuclear disarmament and tighter international arms regulation through agreements such as the Nucl ...

(CND), Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG)
Federation of Worker Writers and Community Publishers

Friends of the Earth Friends of the Earth International (FoEI) is an international network of grassroots environmental organizations in 73 countries. About half of the member groups call themselves "Friends of the Earth" in their own languages; the others use other ...

, Gay Men's Press, Interaction Inprint, Institute of Race Relations (IRR), NCCL (National Council for Civil Liberties, now Liberty), Onlywomen Press, Onyx Press, Sheba Feminist Publishers, WRRC Women’s Research and Resources Centre,

and many more. Pamphlets were distributed from many different publishers and campaigning organisations as well as one-off campaigns. PDC and S&N both distributed thousands of copies of ''Protest and Survive'' written by E. P. Thompson and published by Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation/Spokesman Books, a critical anti-nuclear reply to Protect and Survive published by the government. Academic journals included: ''

Capital & Class ''Capital & Class'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal covering the fields of politics and economics, especially concerning Marxism Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical ...

'', ''

'', '' Gay Left'', ''Ideology and Consciousness'', '' m/f'', ''

Race and Class ''Race & Class'' is a Peer review, peer-reviewed academic journal on contemporary racism and imperialism. It is published quarterly by SAGE Publications on behalf of the Institute of Race Relations (United Kingdom), Institute of Race Relations and ...