Dutch bookstore Polare closes (temporarily)

[Rumpelteazer]

Popular Dutch bookstore Polare will close 20 of their store from tomorrow. They say it will be temporarily, while they think up a "strategic reorganization". The outlet stores and the Belgian Polare stores will remain open.

Last year bookstores Selexyz (new books) and De Slegte (second hand books) merged into Polare. Stores were closed/merged and people were fired. They also opened a new website and released an app.

In November the biggest Dutch book supplier, CB, lowered Polares credit, which triggered the first reorganisation. Earlier this month CB announced the had stopped selling books to Polare. After a week or so came the announcement that they solved their differences. This solution meant that from May 2014 Polare would be in the black again. However, they haven't been able to find the credit until then.

Source.
(in Dutch)

Personally I would miss my local Polare store if it closes. I love to walk around the store every couple of weeks. However, even before I got an ereader I stopped buying books from them. Mostly because of the rude behaviour of the people working the fiction section and their reluctance to order non-popular books I wanted (I even offered to pay up front, but that wasn't possible).

[Apache]

Most stores doing a reorganization stay open while they think about changes. That way they still have money coming in.
Apache

[Rumpelteazer]

I also think they will either close or they will be taken over by yet another company. It's a shame though, since the bookstore in my city, Utrecht, has existed since 1753.

It used to be a store that was known around the country, like Scheltema in Amsterdam, when they opened at their current location in the 1970s they were the biggest bookstore in Europe.

But over the years with not only the various name changes but also changes in the concept of the store.

Broese used to be a real bookstore, with high shelves against the walls, lower ones to define various sections and some tables to display books to a store with high shelves against the walls, most shelves with the books not with the spine forward but the cover (so less books) and a lot of tables with new/popular books. They started to focus on the new and popular books, getting rid of the classics, reducing the number of English books and getting rid of the French and German books.

I hope another bookstore will take it's place, but I expect the space will either become a clothing store or with will be incorporated by the library above it.

[mbovenka]

Originally Posted by Rumpelteazer

Personally I would miss my local Polare store if it closes. I love to walk around the store every couple of weeks. However, even before I got an ereader I stopped buying books from them. Mostly because of the rude behaviour of the people working the fiction section and their reluctance to order non-popular books I wanted (I even offered to pay up front, but that wasn't possible).

I won't particularly miss them; I've pretty much stopped buying paper books since 2007. But I found the staff at my local Polare (back in 2008, when it still was a Selexyz) quite helpful when I needed a new ereader right now () because my Cybook Gen3 kicked the bucket.

The fact that she was an ebook ethusiast herself (she owned an iLiad) probably helped.

[mbovenka]

Originally Posted by Rumpelteazer

I also think they will either close or they will be taken over by yet another company. It's a shame though, since the bookstore in my city, Utrecht, has existed since 1753.

It used to be a store that was known around the country, like Scheltema in Amsterdam, when they opened at their current location in the 1970s they were the biggest bookstore in Europe.

Yep, Broese Kemink (as I still know them) and Scheltema will both be gone if Polare folds. That will be a sad thing, even if I don't really buy paper books anymore.