Introducing Paul Seaton, the author of A Sixpenny Romance, celebrating a century of value at Woolworths

Introducing Paul Seaton
Author of A Sixpenny Romance, celebrating a century of value at Woolworths

Sixpenny Romance author Paul Seaton
"Writing A Sixpenny Romance was a labour of love. When I set out Woolies was entering its ninety-ninth year and the plan was to celebrate the centenary of a national institution that has a special place in my heart and with countless shoppers across the UK.

The store chain's Directors gave me unrestricted access to their archives, revealing a treasure trove of documents that had never been reviewed by an historian before. Friends and colleagues gave pictures and shared stories and memories from their long service with the business.

We were all shocked by the sudden collapse of Woolies. My first priority was to help my former workmates to find new jobs by creating WoolworthsReunited dotcom. But in parallel I redoubled my efforts to write a book that celebrates everything that's best about the brand."

Paul Seaton is a history graduate from Liverpool University who went on to work for Woolies for more than twenty-five years, starting out in the stores as a trainee and rising to be a Store Manager and later working in Regional Management before moving to the firm's Head Office in London. In recent times Paul was in charge of systems for the stores and the £80m a year woolworths.co.uk website. He was also responsible for the firm's main change initiatives from EPOS and new store formats to the crucial Information Systems underpinning the £2½bn business and the actions needed to put the Board's new propositions and strategy into effect.

As a hobby, in complete contrast to his work on leading-edge technology, Paul researched Woolworths' history, building a unique archive of documents, photographs, products and ephemera, which he shared in the Woolworths Virtual Museum website which he published in 2004. The site had more than a million visitors per year between 2005 and 2008, and has been nominated as a national treasure.

Paul was invited to write a chapter for the official commemorative brochure marking the sixtieth anniversary of the D-Day Landings. He has appeared on both television and radio, both as an historian - on BBC tv's 'Shopping for England' in the Edwardians series and Radio 2's 'The Wonderful Sound of Woolies' - and in recognition of his work in finding new jobs for more than 4,500 people. He was dubbed 'Mr Woolies' by BBC tv's Panorama and has made several appearances as part of ITN's coverage of the Credit Crunch, including one on their flagship News at Ten programme.

Paul researched, wrote, illustrated and typeset A Sixpenny Romance and says:

"It's a celebration not a funeral. If you are looking for a book that blames people for Woolworths' collapse or criticises the new brand owner, Shop Direct Group, you've come top the wrong place. I think if Frank Woolworth was starting out today he would probably head straight for the Internet, with its low costs and massive reach. Frank would be amazed that his simple five-and-ten and three-and-six stores could have survived 130 years and served more than 33 billion transactions. I hope he'd like the book and think I've done a decent job of telling his story. And I'm hoping that people who read the book will drop me a line and tell me what they think of it."

Email Paul Seaton | Preview the book | Visit WoolworthsReunited.com | Visit the Virtual Museum | Paul's company WWW Group Ltd

Take a sneak preview of Paul Seaton's book 'A Sixpenny Romance, celebrating a century of value at Woolworths'

Introducing Paul Seaton Author of A Sixpenny Romance, celebrating a century of value at Woolworths

Introducing Paul Seaton
Author of A Sixpenny Romance, celebrating a century of value at Woolworths