The People's Choice - Vote now!

Thank you for your interest in The People's Choice Awards. Voting has now closed. 

Winners will be announced on this site on 16 October 2023. Hover over "Our Davids" in the top menu to find a list of this year's winners after that date.

Entrant: Book Discussion Scheme

City: Christchurch

Website: https://bds.org.nz

About My Business

Book Discussion Scheme (BDS) is a small, but mighty non-profit offering New Zealand's only book club subscription service. From our headquarters in Christchurch, our small team dispatches monthly book club reads to over 1,300 book groups across Aotearoa New Zealand, which equates to over 130,000 books every year! We take care of all the logistics of running a book club so you can focus on how being part of a book club enhances your wellbeing: Read a diverse range of books, broaden your perspectives, learn new things, share or rediscover your passion for reading, meet new people or stay in regular contact with friends. Reading is better when done together! We provide enough copies for everyone in your book club to read the same book at the same time, and include professionally-prepared discussion questions to help you get the most out of your book group meetings and go deeper with your reading if you wish. We also offer free delivery New Zealand-wide (rural addresses included), and can supply convenient subsidised courier bags to make returning your books each month super easy. Our catalogue contains over 1,150 titles for book groups to choose from and we add 60 new titles every year. We have an incredible range of books: Historical classics and recent releases, New Zealand and international authors, prize-winning novels and thought-provoking non-fiction - all vetted for their suitability as book club reads with plenty to discuss. For those not ready to start their own book group, we advertise all existing BDS groups looking for more members on our website so they can be contacted directly by those wanting to join. You can also advertise yourself here, as an individual wanting to start a group, so other like-minded people in your area can contact you. In addition to our full-year standard programme (ten book sets per year, with an optional Dec/Jan 'Holiday Read') we also offer a bimonthly programme for those who may find reading one book every month challenging. We also offer tailored and subsidised versions of our standard programme to priority groups, which you can read more about below.

Why We Should Win The Peoples Choice Award

Our mission is to create a fairer, kinder, stronger, happier Aotearoa New Zealand by promoting the personal and societal benefits of book groups. If, like us, you believe that "Open Books, Open Minds" ' we'd appreciate your vote! We are a registered charitable trust and non-profit, operating NZ-wide for the last 50 years. We make starting or joining a book club easy and fun by providing monthly book sets and discussion questions to over 1,300 book clubs around the country. This allows the groups to focus on enjoying their book clubs without the stress and expense of sourcing multiple copies of the same book for everyone to read. We are a member of the FWEA which promotes continuing and community education for a just and equitable society. To remove barriers to participation and promote these benefits in under-represented sectors, we also subsidise and prioritise: prison book groups, ESOL and migrant book groups, library book groups, men's book groups and rural book groups. We also offer a highschool-based half programme for young people. There are also lots of opportunities to volunteer with us coordinating some of these priority book groups. We maintain an affordable membership fee that keeps us sustainable without the need to pull New Zealand's stretched charity dollar from other organisations. However, we also believe that cost should never be a barrier to participation. In addition to the priority groups outlined above, anyone facing financial hardship is eligible for a subsidised membership from BDS on a case-by-case basis. Here's what some of our nearly 13,000 members have to say about what their book group means to them: 'The people and the books we read lead to conversations that make us cry, laugh, change our views of the world and grow as both a group and as individuals.' "We have learned to see things from both sides, and not in black and white terms" "I've gained confidence in expressing myself" "Conversations start with the book and end up with the men talking about their lives, which is something men don't tend to do" 'I have met women I probably would never have met otherwise" "We're exposed to different points of view and perspectives. It makes us more tolerant" "When I arrived in NZ it was my lifesaver from loneliness and homesickness" "I connected with my local community" "I am now back into reading after a lapse of ten years" "Deep friendships have grown over our shared love of reading" Your vote will help us get the word out about our service to as many Kiwis as possible so they can experience these same benefits. Thank you!


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