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Nate the great · 11-26-2009, 07:48 AM

If you've been following publishing news this past week you'll have read the reports about Borders UK having financial difficulty. Distributors walk away, Borders website stops taking orders, Borders UK up for sale, etc. The latest report from The Bookseller blog is that Borders UK has entered administration.

Edit: It's now officially happened. London based MCR has announced that it has been appointed as administrator for Bokrders UK.

In the coming weeks at least one uninformed reporter will claim that ebooks killed off this company. That reporter is an idiot. If anything killed Borders UK (other than managerial incompetence), it was the internet, not ebooks. In the US (which has the most developed ebook market) ebooks account for about 1% of book sales. Web retailers account for about half of all book sales. Which do you really think affected a brick&mortar store more?

11-26-2009, 07:48 AM	#1
Nate the great Sir Penguin of Edinburgh Posts: 12,375 Karma: 23555235 Join Date: Apr 2007 Location: DC Metro area Device: Shake a stick plus 1	Borders UK enters administration If you've been following publishing news this past week you'll have read the reports about Borders UK having financial difficulty. Distributors walk away, Borders website stops taking orders, Borders UK up for sale, etc. The latest report from The Bookseller blog is that Borders UK has entered administration. Edit: It's now officially happened. London based MCR has announced that it has been appointed as administrator for Bokrders UK. In the coming weeks at least one uninformed reporter will claim that ebooks killed off this company. That reporter is an idiot. If anything killed Borders UK (other than managerial incompetence), it was the internet, not ebooks. In the US (which has the most developed ebook market) ebooks account for about 1% of book sales. Web retailers account for about half of all book sales. Which do you really think affected a brick&mortar store more? Last edited by Nate the great; 11-26-2009 at 02:32 PM.