Are you Er, Dr or Mr? Get every book you need
CHENNAI: This is where data structures come together with Gray’s Anatomy; where object oriented programming is side by side with medical microbiology. Welcome to Er Dr Mr, a shop specialising in college books. Started five years ago by K Selvakumar from Tirunelveli, this shop in Anna Nagar specialises in books for three professionals — engineering, medicine and business administration. “We started this because there are a lot of professionals in Anna Nagar, Koyambedu and the surroundings, but no specialised book stores for them,” explains Selvakumar. The name itself comes from precisely this — er for engineers, dr for doctors and mr for MBA grads.
A whole section is dedicated to ‘local authors’ — simplified books (like the ‘guides’ back in school) preferred by engineers because the ‘foreign authors’ are sometimes too tough to understand. “Most of our clients know what they want — they explore and pick up the books they need,” explains Prabhu, who works part time in the shop.
The bookstore gives up to 25% discount on medical and up to 15% discount on engineering titles. There are a whopping 50,000 titles crammed into the shop, but that’s not enough for Selvakumar. “We get our books directly from publishers. If a certain book is not available, we make it a point to get it within a day. We have three delivery boys too,” he says. And no, it doesn’t stop here either.
“We deliver even to other cities by bus. Customers can pick up their orders at the nearest bus stand. We are now working on an online model too. Soon, you can order books online,” explains Prabhu. Books for several competitive exams are also lined up, but these are not as exhaustive as the others. “We also have these because because many engineering students now write competitive exams,” says Prabhu.
Selvakumar, who came to Chennai in 2002, says that medical books are a big market. The shop is also trying to bring in an online model. For details, call 93822 63366