Bookstore Chain Borders is Dead
blogs.wsj.com
blogs.wsj.com
I moved to Germany some 9 years ago. In my first trips back to the US a bookstore was one of the detours I was most excited about. I'd typically return to Germany with a couple hundred bucks worth of books stuffed into my bag. My family, noticing this, started a habit of buying me B&N gift certificates (a pattern that's continued to this day).
But now, 9 years and thousands of dollars of Amazon.de purchases later, I can't say that I'm terribly excited about visiting the big box stores. I struggled to spend my most recent gift certificate. Struggled! I went looking for books on Chinese history, and in a two story Barnes and Noble in an upscale Houston neighborhood there were two books on the history of the most populous country in the world. There were huge aisles of random throwaway junk, games and other silliness and two books on Chinese history. Nor did they have Bertrand Russel's Principles of Mathematics or Aldous Huxley's Chrome Yellow.
I love books. Paper books. I have around a thousand of them. But I won't cry for the passing of the big-box stores if they're bent on becoming the Wal-Mart of reading.
There's likely some bad decision making behind a move towards a 'Wal-Mart-ification' of the big-box stores, but are you sure they could have survived if they tried to compete with the advantages of a warehouse full of diverse stock and shelf space that is virtual and costs nothing to expand by adding pages (ala Amazon).
It seems to me that they've acted more like fish in a pond that's been drying up. Struggling to stay in a deep enough spot to keep breathing.
I get a better price, better selection and more information browsing Amazon, but I'm not about to blame the physical book stores for going out of business because they changed, man.
Related: http://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2011/07/12/the-secret-boo...
Borders was a revelation when it showed up on Rockville Pike outside Washington. I was delighted when it came to downtown at 18th & L NW. But during the last several years I could see (for example) the poetry shelves squeezing down from most of two free-standing chest-height shelves to part of one; the history section much compressed; the computing shelves progressively thinner and less organized.
Electronic stores are another example of the same thing, and IMO, have been hurt because of it. There are a lot of short-term gains for long-term losses.
I think consumers warmed to buying on the internet because the local stores failed them. They were willing to pay the premium and were scared of and disliked online transactions. Now, the cat is out of the bag.
Some of this was due to commercial real estate prices shooting up but a good amount was their own doing.
Have you noticed that many brands, in many different markets, that had the biggest following 10 to 15 years ago are some of the worst now? They rid the brand to death for short-term gains. Now, I take a good look at the less-known brands before ever thinking of going with the big traditional names.
I love books. I also like paper books, but I believe that in the long run we're better off without them for economic and environmental reasons, and e-books are a pretty darned good alternative. I think that the inherent value of a book is its contents. Whether it is tangible or not doesn't matter as much.
Because of this, I think book romanticism is pretty stupid. However, I can't help but feel captivated by it. I have a few theories on why this may be so:
I do like that my books are tangible possessions, that I can look back at the notes my father made into them in college, that I can find an old train pass I used as a bookmark that brings back memories. Or I know that that mark is from when I spilled coffee all over my theory of computation book when I fell asleep studying for the final. I associate my books with other things, thoughts. Currently this doesn't quite work this way with e-books. That's why they don't feel "personal". This can be remedied, but I don't know to what extent.
I don't give a damn about big box stores, but I care very much about my local stores. The difference is in experience. When I'm buying a book, I don't want to feel like I'm a standardized entity there to benefit a company whose sole purpose is to maximize profits. The alternative to this what I can only describe as "intellectual flirtation".
Example: Today I happened to have some free time and I wandered into my favorite bookstore. I looked around, grabbed a book about Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and sat in a corner reading for an hour. No one nagged me to buy anything. The book was well written but it wasn't as comprehensive as I hoped, so I moved to the fiction section, and onto mathematics, dipping into books as I wished. Finally, I found a book about the role of Tea in Japanese culture and decided to buy it. While I was paying, the cashier struck up a conversation with me about the book itself and we had a small debate about the topic and he also recommended another author to me.
Now, as you can see the act of going to a bookstore is not a thing I do just to buy books. I do it so I can have a change of scenery and pace, relax, learn and have some personal time to just think (when do we do that, seriously?). I also do it because it's profoundly social (i.e. not web 2.0 style "me too" social). I like conversing about the things I find interesting, and it seems bookstores gather people like me, whether they work there or just visit to buy. Finally, the cost of all this is a possible few extra dollars on my book.
It's a tough choice for me.
To say books are an environmental detriment is incorrect; wood (paper) is one of the most renewable of resources, and when harvested responsibly (as is done in the US on the whole), it actually creates a net of more trees planted than would otherwise exist in our modern society.
Arguably, the plastics and battery chemicals of ebook readers is more damaging to our planet. Not that I think it's a particular concern.
To your last three paragraphs, I agree.
In the grand scheme of things though, you're definitely better off trading in the SUV than worrying about the environmental footprint of your personal library.
Every week I probably throw out* a half-kilo of ads stuffed into my mailbox, one circular every week from every major grocery and department-store chain in the area. It would only take a few months to accumulate as much paper in grocery-store ads as all the books I've bought in my life.
* Well, I recycle it, but afaik the recyclability of glossy/coated paper is fairly poor/inefficient.
http://www.thestar.com/article/584523
I agree though, my common sense tells me that books are probably not a real contributor, but I couldn't say for sure without researching it a bit (I've been surprised before).
Interesting about the environmental aspect. What about all the waste though? I guess it gets recycled eventually.
It's rare for a person to read more than a couple thousand books in a lifetime. That's under 2 cubic meters of space total. That's massively dwarfed by the amount of waste that we generate in a lifetime. I'd need about 3 years worth of books to fill up a trash bag.
Sort of a bookstore version of HN, I suppose.
Totally.
When are you opening?
http://www.yelp.com/biz/boston-athenaeum-boston
A bit old timey but they do have a great book and art collection, a reading room, a separate room to just read newspapers, discussion events. They also lend iPads and kindles to members.
For those who live in Tokyo, this might be interesting, but I want the one without such a superficial academic style: http://www.academyhills.com/library/index.html
" The London Library is now the world's largest independent lending library. It owes its foundation in 1841 to the vision of Thomas Carlyle, who in many ways remains its tutelary genius. But he was not alone in his desire to establish an institution which would allow subscribers to enjoy something of the wealth of a national library for use in their own homes: the Earl of Clarendon, that enlightened early-Victorian politician, was the Library's first president, Thackeray its first auditor; Gladstone and Sir Edward Bunbury were on the first committee. Early members included Dickens and George Eliot. The Library's long-standing role at the centre of the intellectual life of the nation is reflected in the roll-call of its past presidents and vice-presidents, which include Tennyson, Kipling, T. S. Eliot, Rebecca West and Isaiah Berlin. The Library's current president is Sir Tom Stoppard.
The Library stands at the north-west corner of St James's Square, as it has since 1845, after briefly occupying the first floor of the Travellers Club in Pall Mall
I think there is a tendency in people to totemize things. This makes a certain amount of sense -- they get attached to thier tools, because they are competent with them. But more than that, they attach memories to them, as you suggest. This is more than just with books: I certainly mourn the passing of keyboards, it takes a while to get the feel to even another one of the same model. I also have a certain affinity towards one old beaten up shovel I garden with, despite the abundance of better choices in the world.
An interesting thing I learned once, is that people are very good at learning by associating various bits of knowledge with places -- to the point that sometimes they only know some things in some places. This make sense, and there is plenty written on it.
I wonder if combining the two notions results in this affinity for books -- a combination of keeping knowledge and thoughts and feelings in the place (the book) and our love of our tools (I mean really, my new copy of APUE just doesn't do it for me the way my old worn in one did -- that one had a presence, this one just has some information, and I'm almost certain it doesn't know as much about ttys as the last one did :P ).
Anyway all that aside -- there is another aspect to physical book we must consider: scent -- books have scent and the brain is wired to respond subconsiously to various aromas. I am certain that if you grow up and love books, the smell of them has special place in your emotional processing centers. (seriously, a mysterious tome of arcane computer knowledge smells different than a well loved novel, and certainly a forgotten volume from the used book seller has a different aura than a new edition from B&N, which in turn is different from the same edition from Amazon).
Finally, maybe there is some aspect to books that comes from the refinement of the technology for a thousand years. The book is a highly polished technology - and it shows.
Anyway, enough rambling. Thanks for engaging my thinker :)
I disagree, at least until e-books get much, much better. Dead tree books are still easier for me to read in a number of ways (ranging from actual ease of transferring information from the medium to the brain to not having the ability to open up TVTropes on my dead trees to the easy visual indicator letting me know that I've only got a couple more pages or that I should maybe stop for the night). I can quickly and easily jot down notes in the margin that are both apparent and easy to read on further rereads (the copy of The Count of Monte Cristo I have annotated over the years is a dear treasure to me) and I've yet to see anything that works so well in electronic form. Perhaps the most difficult thing to fix, though, is simply the way memory works. It often happens that I will want to reread a certain scene (or bit of information, in the case of nonfiction) but I don't really remember any good keywords from the scene, so an e-book search wouldn't do much good. Nevertheless, a strong visual memory is very helpful here: I'm usually able to quickly turn to the appropriate part of the book and start investigating bottom halves of left pages or what have you. From my experience, this same sort of search is far more tedious and less effective on e-books as they are today.
Now, is any of this universal? I hardly think so. It's not really complete, though, and I'm willing to bet that a large number of avid readers have their necessary features where e-books are lacking, and these extend beyond simple romanticism. I mean, sure, there is a lot of romanticism also buried in there (ever notice how the olfactory experience is so much richer with books than with Kindles?), but it's hardly the whole picutre.
That's not to say that e-books can't catch up to alleviate some of these issues, but I find it borderline ridiculous to say that there's no inherent value in the tangibility of a book.
The current crop of publishers and editors are operating without the vaguest hint of a clue. We're in a slump, but I'm not sure when (or even if) we're going to see any kind of recovery.
I'm pretty sure I know how to solve the problem, but nobody would like the answer.
The issue IMHO is that:
1) their buyers, who are the people that decide what each store stocks, deteriorated from "people who knew books" to "people who knew inventory control" ; as a result, the bookstore selection has gotten markedly worse as you have noticed.
2) they have suffered from a lack of seriousness in approaching what a good bokstore should be. Instead of being true to themselves and having an excellent book selection, they add "features" like a coffee shop, games, paper and pens, etc. all of which dilutes their original purpose.
The failure of the chain isn't a commentary on the changing book market, it's a commentary what happens to businesses that abuse debt and make decisions for the short term than have negative long-term implications.
The problem is that people have diverse interests (niches) and a typical brick and mortar retail operation simply can't afford to carry much depth in any particular niche. The result is a lot of niches shallowly represented, at most big box stores you can't even find all of the books written by a given author, even famous ones, unless they are insanely popular at the moment.
Ironically I think in the next few decades the pre-internet trend will reverse and independent used bookstores will stick around longer than the chains.
If you went into the sci-fi section, you wouldn't find Philip Dick, Stanislaw Lem, or even a decent selection of Asimov -- you'd find a bunch of sci-fi books written the previous couple of years, and in many cases, sequels without the originals.
Finding books of quality at Borders was hard. I'd often want a book, go in there for half an hour, and find nothing. The value-add of a good bookstore is that they will have pre-selected the best books for you. If I go many of the little used book shops in my area, it will be a rotating selection of excellent books. Not every book will necessarily be my style, but every book on the shelves will be great, and there will be books on most topics. This is much more useful.
I don't really understand why this was the case. Borders ought to have economies of scale, and really ought to be able to have some central office somewhere picking out good books. Somehow, the selection was random and crappy instead.
I think part of the problem was that Borders probably went the route of overusing metrics, and providing more books similar to the ones that sold, which lead to a bunch of crappy books on popular topics (where it's much more useful to the customer to e.g. have the top 3 books on videography than the top 3 books, hidden in a bookcase of crappy books, where the good ones take an hour or two to find).
Our independent bookstores are still alive, luckily.
Our Borders had a tolerable collection of CS texts, diminishing in quality over the past couple of years. When they stopped getting new SF in on release days, I stopped buying books there.
http://www.quora.com/Borders-Books/Why-is-Barnes-and-Noble-p...
That was over a decade ago; now that Borders is gone, closed last fall. B&N is the only real bookstore left in the area. There are a couple of independents but they have very limited inventory and seem to make their living selling a lot of accessories, pens, and stationery.
I hope this event helps cause a resurgence in the indy stores. I need to make it to the local Tattered cover soon, though I plan to make it for GRRMs signing end of this month.
[1]http://www.npr.org/2011/06/30/137529480/how-to-make-it-as-an...
I'll have to listen to that later, thanks for the link.
Now that one of the big companies are gone, would this mean more independent shops are on the way? I hope so.
A strange journey: from local indie, to indie killer, to dead.
I don't know whether the building has any historical protection, however, I wouldn't be surprised if it disappears given the suddenness of the Cal Ave tree snafu a couple of years back.
For those that don't know, California Avenus is part of 'old' Palo Alto, and has a bunch of boutiques, restaurants, and cafes. It was lined with shade trees that had been there since the city had been founded, and was overall a very nice place to be.
A few years back, the city decided to, uh, beautify the area by cutting down all the trees, and this happened almost overnight. The street now feels like a seedy part of LA, and is nowhere as nice a place to be, thanks to the local government.
Off-topic, but there's a fantastic bagel shop near the corner of California and El Camino that I highly recommend.
You already see that now with Coffee Shops, Internet Cafes and so on. We have a free market system and a free market system is based on there being an entrepreneur for every need.
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/01/what-wen...
I personally preferred our local Borders stores over the Barnes and Nobles. They usually had more titles in stock and were a little nicer furnished. But they started to go downhill about 2 years ago, with more and more empty space, damaged carpets, trashed bathrooms, etc.
Lots of new books, magazines, and it's cheaper to boot. Some of them are really beautiful too.
40+ million books and other media loaned each year and 10 million things to loan. All with a single library card at almost any library. They're even talking about adding Kindle books to the collection.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Information_Network_for_...
Just about all the libraries I've been in have been really nice places.
With opening hours like that, who can go to the library? Pensioners, and every now and then a lost student who needs something from the local history archive. It's ridiculous, it's a huge, fairly beautiful building too, and 75% of the time it's empty.
Oh and coffee (tiny, 4 US fluid ounces! be sure not to pay attention when you drink because it's gone before you know!) costs 2 euros (2.8 USD). Don't spend an afternoon there, it'll set you back a tenner.
http://www.freep.com/article/20110717/COL01/107170485/Mitch-...
The cinemas of today... they are totally different like those circus with 20 elephants and tigers you just can't see it again.
Maybe it is time for people like google guys to enter and record with the street view tech what is like a bookstore of today because maybe it is obvious for us but our children will not know what is it.
I'm digitalizing all my books with the fantastic Fujitsu S1500 so I don't have to carry a metric ton of books around with me. Ebook tech will only improve, it is in its infancy today.
The fact is, we buy most of our books on Amazon or other online retailers; the bookstore is a form of cheap entertainment for us, not a serious place to shop. Their variety of inventory simply wasn't good enough to rely on (I paint Barnes and Noble with this brush as well, and the last time I was in a Chapters, it was similar), and overnight shipping is close enough to instant gratification for us.
Wonder what type of place could survive and be profitable at the size of the typical borders stores (20-30k sq feet)?
I've spent some time trying to come up with good uses for empty big box stores. I now have an empty Circuit City, Borders, and grocery store within a few miles of my house. They get used seasonally for fireworks or Halloween or calendar retailers ("the hermit crabs of the retail industry") but nothing else.
I'd love to see someone go into one and open a laser tag / trampoline / rock climbing / indoor playground type space, especially one with tables and wifi.
Do you have this sort of problem there too?
Many new developments in suburban areas further outside of the denser areas are offering tenants the first year free to get their feet settled. I think this is a smart move, and wish more landlords were that forward thinking.
I'd love to see what types of retail is succeeding right now. I'll have my virtual assistant do some research on this and get back to you. Which retail sectors are growing in this economy, etc.
I know where I am going this weekend.
When I buy books, I usually buy how-to books to teach myself something. Even though they were dirt cheap, I kept thinking to myself: "I could easily get this information for free online." I ended up leaving not having bought anything.
Book costs $5, but I could get it for free online. Hrm... If I have a physical book sitting on my nightstand staring at me, am I more likely to actually read the material? If yes, is the difference between not reading and reading the material worth $5 to me?
Originally, I bought a Nook over the Kindle because there was a rather large number of free public domain books that I wanted to read and the Nook supported open formats. I pulled down hundreds of books from Project Gutenberg.
Barnes and Noble pushes them in all their stores and believe it or not, Amazon doesn't have every customer in the world. Physical stores can still push a product better than an ad can.
Given their share of the e-book market, vs. their current $1B market cap, B&N certainly looks undervalued. There's a reason why firms like Liberty Media have been making bids on the company -- they see money to be made there.
Things can always change, but from my (limited) vantage point the two companies aren't on the same path at all.
They've executed well on their eBook strategy (although they came to the party late too).
They have Starbucks in their stores.
Not to discount those things, but is that really the different between bankruptcy and success?
Physical books, on the other hand, require no special playback technology and are arguably one of the most perfect user interfaces ever devised. I have century old books in my library that are still fascinating and useable, in contrast to my collection of audio tape, floppy disks, and even some CDs that can no longer be read reliably (my vinyl still works, though). It feels a bit premature to declare the end of physical books.
Vinyl has a lot of aficionados though.