Are you getting ready to pack your bags and head out for someplace you`ve never been? Bob Katzman has some advice for you.
”Read a few books on the place before you go,” urges Katzman, the general manager of Le Grand Tour (formerly Europa), a world travel bookstore at 3229 N. Clark St. ”Find a travel writer you can trust, one who can point out things to see that you might otherwise miss.”
Putting Katzman`s advice into action is easy enough. Travelers who want to learn more about their destinations before they board the plane, train or ship (or hop into the family car) can find a good, general selection of travel books and accommodation guides at the nearest neighborhood and chain bookstores in the city or suburbs. But what about when you`re in the market for more specialized maps or more offbeat information-for example, you`re organizing a biking trip in the Southwest and need to know about elevation levels, or you`re planning a trip to Paris and want to know how to swear with savoir-faire in French?
That`s when you may want to visit one of Chicago`s travel-oriented specialty bookstores.
For such bookstores as Le Grand Tour, the Savvy Traveller, and the Rand McNally Map and Travel Stores, travel-related items are their only business, and knowledgeable owners, managers and clerks pride themselves on being able to suggest the right guides to suit particular needs.
”If a person tells me that they`re a student on a budget, for example, I would tell them to get the `Let`s Go` series of guidebooks or the `Lonely Planet` books for whatever country they want to go to,” says Katzman. ”But for someone who is 60 years old, who`s financially comfortable and doesn`t want to rough it, I would suggest the `Blue Guide` series of guidebooks, which are aimed at an upscale clientele.”
Le Grand Tour
Katzman, who took over as manager of the 20-year-old Europa bookstore two years ago, rechristened it Le Grand Tour (phone 312-929-1836) earlier this year and began a campaign to turn the store into the city`s most complete travel bookstore, reaching out to all kinds of travelers.
”I felt that the name `Europa` sounded too European and excluded a lot of people, especially minorities,” explains Katzman. ” `Le Grand Tour`
sounds European, too, but it doesn`t say `for white people only.` I also expanded our selection of books on Africa, and now we`re getting more black and African customers along with people (of European descent) headed for Europe, Asia and the Soviet Union.”
Operating under the theory that ”people like a feeling of plenty,”
Katzman has crammed Le Grand Tour virtually floor-to-ceiling with merchandise. The long, narrow store carries guidebooks on 150 countries in 70 languages and stocks the complete line of Michelin maps, along with maps from five European map companies. Maps of Africa are available by country and region.
Language-learning tapes are available at a variety of skill levels in 50 languages, including Arabic, Czech, Japanese, Thai, Ukrainian and Zulu. There are 70 English-based bilingual dictionaries from around the world, and illustrated bilingual children`s dictionaries in Armenian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Estonian, Polish and Ukrainian.
”Most of our customers used to be headed for Europe, and European travel books are still among our best-sellers,” says Katzman. ”But now a lot of people are headed for Latin America, so we just doubled the size of our Latin American section.” (One member of the store`s three-person staff also speaks Spanish.) The store also recently added books on Thailand, another popular destination.
In addition to guidebooks, foreign dictionaries and maps, Le Grand Tour stocks a variety of related literature reflecting Katzman`s philosophy that
”a travel store should be fun.”
The section on Holland, for example, includes the maps and travel guides that you would expect. But it also includes the children`s classic ”Hans Brinker or the Silver Skates” and a book on Vincent Van Gogh. The French section includes not one but two books on how to curse like a native (similar guides also are available in Italian and Russian and, according to Katzman, are perennially popular). The German section includes crossword puzzle books in that language.
If you want to read up on a country`s cinema as well as its cultural history, chances are you can find a book on the topic here, along with cups and T-shirts inscribed with a variety of messages in a variety of languages and dialects, including Alsatian. ”We`re always looking for more things on obscure countries and nationalities,” says Katzman.
The Savvy Traveller
Sandye Wexler, founder of the Savvy Traveller, 50 E. Washington St.
(phone 312-263-2100), used to travel a lot herself-and frequently found herself frustrated at the few books on Third World countries and the other
”way-out” destinations she favored.
”I figured that other people were having trouble getting information about these places, too,” says Wexler. ”And it was hard to get a lot of the travel gear I was looking for. So I decided to open a store.”
Wexler launched the Savvy Traveller four years ago, stocking a wide range of books and maps plus a selection of soft luggage, travel videos, pocket-sized multilingual electronic translators, money belts, waterproof
topographical maps, socks with pockets for stashing cash, travel diaries, magnetic travel games and mosquito-netting hats. The store, located on the second floor, is large and airy.
”We try to cover the waterfront and carry just about any travel book we hear of,” says Wexler. ”We seek out small publishers too; if they put out a gem, we want to get it. We also carry the map that French cab drivers use, which is very complete and detailed and can be hard to find.
”We try to find out if customers know about books we don`t have; we`re always looking for ways to improve our collection. The more you know about what you`re going to see, the more you can appreciate it.”
Currently, Savvy Traveller best-sellers include books on France, Britain and Italy. ”Books on New York and California also do well, and we`re seeing more people who are going to Turkey, Africa, Indonesia, Thailand and Central and South America,” says Wexler.
The store publishes a free quarterly newsletter, also called the Savvy Traveller, which features info about new books and upcoming Chicago-area travel seminars.
Rand McNally
The Rand McNally Map & Travel Stores have a long tradition behind them:
The firm, one of the largest producers of road maps, dates to the 1800s. The Rand McNally Map & Travel Store at 444 N. Michigan Ave. (phone 312-321-1751)
is of more recent vintage; the branch opened in March. Like its older and slightly larger Rand McNally counterpart at 150 S. Wacker Dr. (312-332-2009), the store carries a wide range of glossy and nitty-gritty travel books, videos, maps and globes, along with Filofax organizers, games, children`s activity books and hand-held electronic translators.
Guidebooks range from the budget-minded to sky`s-the-limit; a traveler heading for New York, for example, can choose among ”Frommer`s New York on $60 a Day,” ”New York on $1,000 a Day (Before Lunch)” and several other guides that fall somewhere in between. There are also guides for travelers looking for information on regional bed-and-breakfast inns or specialized activities, such as walking tours of various cities.
”We don`t give people advice on where to go, but once they know where they want to travel, we can help with which guides would be best to use,”
says Perry Kim, assistant manager of the Michigan Avenue store.
Not surprisingly, given the stores` history, maps are one of their strengths.
”A lot of people aren`t aware of just how specific some of our maps can get,” says Kim. ”We have maps of little towns in Africa and Poland, for example, and Rand McNally makes maps of just about every county in every state in the United States. We don`t have room to carry all of them, but if you want one we don`t have in stock, we can get it for you in 3 to 5 weeks.”
The store also carries a selection of topographic maps and maps showing elevations.
”We just sold eight Illinois elevation maps to a group of people who were planning a bicycle trip and wanted to know about the grade contours of the area,” says Kim. ”They`ll use the maps to plan rest stops and that sort of thing.”
Noteworthy contenders
Two noteworthy specialty book stores that don`t cater exclusively to travelers but nevertheless carry a large selection of travel books are Rizzoli International Book Store (at 835 N. Michigan Ave., Water Tower Place, third level; 312-642-3500) and Sandmeyer`s Bookstore (714 S. Dearborn St.;
312-922-2104). Both shops carry a variety of high-quality glossy travel tomes as well as an array of information-packed guidebooks.
”Lots of people like our travel-narrative books for armchair travelers, too,” says Sandmeyer`s co-owner Ellen Sandmeyer.
Which guidebooks do Sandmeyer, Wexler and Katzman use when they hit the road? As it turns out, none of them travel as much as they would like.
”I used to travel more,” says Katzman.
”It`s hard, with the store and three children,” laments Sandmeyer.
”I used to travel a lot, but I stopped when I opened this store,” says Wexler. ”I haven`t actually stopped traveling for good, though. I`ve just paused for a while.”
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(All five of these stores accept credit cards and personal checks, handle phone requests and mail orders and ship books all over the country and points beyond.)
