Phone app maps: paper street maps are still popular

Phone app maps are useful. But paper street maps are still popular and are experiencing a renaissance in sales. One map company, the A-Z maps in Britain, even has a musical stage show based on the 80-year evolution of street mapping (The Telegraph, August 4, 2015).

British woman, Phyllis Pearsall, designed a map of London streets in 1935 that is still the most widely used navigational tool in the country. Pearsall, an artist, walked the streets – 3,000 miles to chart 23,000 streets – made notes, sketched the settings by hand, designed a pocket-sized guide, created a company, and self-published her A-Z Atlas and Guide to London and Suburbs.

Now the guide, with red and blue lettering on the cover, is a British icon.

Pearsall (1906-1996), daughter of Hungarian map-maker, worked as a teacher in France, and a shop assistant in Paris, before returning to London in 1926 to marry an artist. The marriage ended in 1935 – and she commenced her map-making idea when she lost her way one day. Over the course of a year she created her map, but publishers rejected her idea. Her father suggested that she establish her own company. WH Smith agreed to stock 250 copies, and Pearsall used a wheelbarrow to hand deliver copies to sales outlets. It became an instant success.

She had to cease her business during World War II when selling maps was banned in England. After the war, paper restrictions in Britain forced her to print the map guide overseas until the early 1960s. In 1966 Pearsal formed the Geographers’ Map Trust to prevent her company from being taken over after her death. She never remarried.

Computers were introduced into the company in 1991, but before that all maps were hand-drawn. After her death in 1996, the company continued. Recently a musical about Pearsall’s life, called The A-Z of Mrs P, was staged at Southward Playhouse. The company can tell their maps from fake ones. To prevent imitations they insert a small deliberate mistake in each edition.

Sales dropped from 2005-2012, but 2015 has seen a resurgence in sales. The company diversified to create Our Adventure Atlases, wallpaper, floor coverings, clothing, mugs, and artwork.

www.az.co.uk

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/cars/features/phyllis-pearsall--the-woman-who-created-a-z-maps/

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