WATCHING countless amounts of books being piled together two-storeys high, then excavated into arm roll bins to be disposed of is a soul crushing experience.
This was a sobering feeling the writer did not expect when visiting Wolf House, BookXcess’ warehouse and HQ in Shah Alam, which unfortunately was one of the casualties of the ‘great flood’ that menaced the Klang Valley recently.
Despite having prepped for the nightmare, one certainly needed a moment to digest the magnitude of the wreckage.
The scenery was akin to visiting a landfill. Only this time, the scraps were entirely literary and non-literary texts that once had unquestionable value.
“Books, documents, basically anything that was directly damaged by the flood, need to be taken out (of the warehouse) quickly so we can attend to the remaining inventory,” said BookXcess co-founder Andrew Yap, adding that the consequential damage is worth between RM30-40 million.
Apart from the books, the damage includes the machines that help to support the wrapping/processing before sending the books to respective outlets, (potential) cancellation of events, and a delay in opening a new outlet at Mitsui Shopping Park LaLaport in Bukit Bintang.
“About 80% of the books that were supposed to be delivered to said store were already packed and ready to go but when the flood happened, it halted logistics and the goods all perished,” said Yap.
Not keeping still
The managing director, who had been busy monitoring the clean-up day in and day out since the water receded, expressed that efforts were totally in-house and privately contracted.
“We haven’t had a visit from the outside (not even the local council) to inspect except for the insurance people.
“Second week in, we still have no running electricity and are fully relying on generators, which is costing us between RM12,000 to RM15,000 a day.
“Some parts of the warehouse are not properly lit, and we are carefully working immediately as we can to alleviate the situation.
“No electricity also means that it has affected the humidity level of the warehouse. It is currently three times higher than usual,” he shared.
According to Yap, the 200,000 sq ft warehouse stores about 10 million books, “... approximately 3 million (books) are damaged.
The remaining books that were not affected (wet or soiled with mud) could not be salvaged due to the uncontrolled temperature.
“If you can see, some of the books have begun to warp and we just don’t want to take the risk of selling them in such qualities,” he expressed.
Thankfully, the inventory for BookXcess’ online purchases are stored on the upper level where the floodwaters did not reach.
“This has allowed for online operations to still run smoothly. That said, we are still working under the limitations of electricity powered only by generators as mentioned earlier,” said Yap.
“For now, a majority of our attention is going to focus on what is affected by the flood before we attend to other matters.
“If recovery goes according to plan, I think we could officially get back on our feet in one month or so from now, especially when we get our machines fully functioning again,” he added, while leading the team in our tour of the warehouse’s upper level.
A systematic but hopeful order
Busy attending to calls, BookXcess executive director and Yap’s fellow co-founder, Jacqueline Ng, sits committed in one of the meeting rooms where the administrative office could be found.
For a moment, everything was business as usual, despite the not so usual circumstances.
She was attending to the working group present at the time, before we moved into a bigger room for an extended interview.
The room was probably the brightest and most vibrant space where one could take refuge, given the gloomy and musky scenario of the compound, no thanks to the flood.
“A lot of people do not realise how massive our operations are, and this is because we are in the business of converting non-readers to readers,” said Ng, who got stranded at the warehouse with some of the staff during the flooding.
“We are in 13 different countries, but 90% of our operations are online. We majorly cater to our export market but our hub is still in Shah Alam.
“Part of our company’s mission is to push for the experience (of reading), and with that comes the sizable scale of the company. That is why you still see us pushing all out in brick-and-mortar by having our outlets design-worthy,” she added.
Wolf House also caters to customers with a designated BookXcess section at the front, but given the mold now forming a week after the flooding, the team is required to demolish and take down the interior for repairs.
“Andrew and I were not privileged enough to grow up in a family that fostered the habit of reading. This made us fully understand why access to books is so important,” said Ng.
“If you look at our team, we are here everyday fighting to keep the business running.
“Right now, we are designating this one week to be specifically for inspection but truthfully, we do not even know what’s in store for us the next week.
“Hence, we are taking it as we go and settling one problem at a time,” she added.
No end to present challenges
“Our recent obstacle is that Tenaga Nasional Berhad (TNB) notified they are not certain when electricity in our area is able to be fully restored, and it could take up to months,” shared Yap.
“They claim the reason for such is because some of the sub-stations blew and the big one nearby powering most buildings in the area is also gone,” he added, noting TNB is able to supply generator sets as a solution, “but that is at a cost.”
According to him, the situation is really crazy because BookXcess has been based at their current headquarters for seven years and, “... we never experienced flooding of this kind except for some little overflow.”
“We have been complaining to the local council many times due to it and something was done to expand the drainage system. However, I can say that the construction works were quite poor because the debris from it was just left out without proper clearing for months,” he added.
“To move to another warehouse and set up another similar one takes about six months, so that may not be the major plan for now,” said Yap.
“This is our home anyway, and we have to continue to pay our loans.
“Think about it, if we don’t want to be here (location wise), how are we going to rent it out to somebody else given the recent event?”
For now, both Yap and Ng are down on the ground with their team, working closely together being as agile as they can be, clearing the path left by the unforeseen storm. – The Vibes, December 29, 2021
