Toadstool moving, but not very far

Thursday, January 26, 2012

Kathy Cleveland photo The cozy cafe at the Peterborough Toadstool Bookshop, Aesop's Tables, above, offers coffee, teas, and breakfast and lunch items,and Willard Williams, Toadstool's owner, hopes to open a similar cafe in the relocated Milford Toadstool.

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MILFORD – The bad news? The Toadstool Bookshop is losing its lease and must move.

The good news? Milford’s independent bookseller isn’t going far; indeed, Toadstool is staying right in Lorden Plaza.

The better news? The space, although smaller than the current Toadstool, has an area fit for a cafe, so something very like Aesop’s Tables, the cafe in the Peterborough Toadstool, the business’s flagship shop, is on the drawing board.

Willard Williams, Toadstool’s co-owner, said last week that the lease has been signed on the new space in the area known as Lorden’s upper plaza, and Toadstool will move in sometime in February.

Already, he said, he has heard “from a number of people who seem to be quite interested” in running the cafe, something he and the Toadstool staff won’t do.

“We don’t know how to run cafes,” he said. “Our plan is to sublease the space and have someone run the cafe themselves. There’s a lot involved for them in terms of figuring out expenses.”

That’s how it’s done in Peterborough and that seems to be working quite well.

In the new space, Toadstool will have 4,800 square fee, 1,200 of which will be for the cafe.

The current Milford Toadstool, which is only a bookshop, has 7,000 square feet, so fitting everything in and offering the same kind of service is going to be a challenge.

“We’ll be condensing,” said Williams.

But Brian Woodbury, a manager of the Milford Toadstool, is optimistic.

“I think it’s a great combination,” he said of the bookstore-cafe idea, “but the challenge will be in still offering the variety.”

The shop will, he said, meet that challenge.

Williams is sorry to lose the old roomy bookshop space, but he likes where they’re going because the new Toadstool will have more window area, allowing a lighter look.

The old space, he said, “is long and narrow” and the new “will be basically square with about 60 feet of windows on the front. Not having the depth of the other place means a lot more natural light.”

It’s not a big move and that’s a good thing, he said.

“We’re pretty confident that people will find us,” said Williams. “We’ve been in the plaza for about 20 years; we’re not going that far.”

There is also a third Toadstool branch, in the Colony Mill Marketplace in Keene.

Michael Cleveland can be reached at 673-3100, ext. 301, or mcleveland@cabinet.com.