(Business Week) Bookstores closed not because of poor sales

[Ryvyan]

Not sure if this has been posted...

According to this Business Week article, most bookstores were making money up until they close.

Nashville lost its bookstores not because people there had abandoned physical books and retailers. For the most part, it lost them remotely, at the corporate level.

Of course Borders was mentioned, and their lack of internet presence has always been annoying, plus nobody picks up the phones in the stores. The other major bookstore (Kinokuniya) has plenty of internet and physical presence, so I tend to gravitate towards them.

That said, will never forget how I queued up overnight with friends for the last Harry Potter book.

[Dr. Drib]

I just read the entire article, and found it extremely interesting.

Thanks.



Don

[carpetmojo]

Me too - absolutely fascinating .

I used to go to the Borders store in Bristol with my son for a mooch, and a comfy sit-down, but I couldn't help feeling the footfall was lower than it should have been for a pretty vast premises in a prime site. And we definitely didn't buy on every visit, I'm afraid.

Waterstones made a much better stab at this type of premises, but even they were in trouble, saved by an "oligarch" .... Hopefully he really is in it for the long-term.

[RainingLemur]

Very good article. Thanks for sharing!

[Kevin8or]

Interesting article with info that was new to me.

[SeaBookGuy]

From employee comments at the time of their demise, I realize Borders had been rather poorly run. I was struck that there isn't a B & N near Nashville at all!

I drop by Kinokuniya here in Seattle every few months to see what new Asian-themed titles in English I might look for at the library.

[Ryvyan]

For a few months leading to their demise here in Singapore, Borders had a shrinking floor area dedicated to music and movies. There were also increasing numbers of books/magazines that were being shrink-wrapped. I think they were on the verge of changing their ways, but when the US one declared bankruptcy, it was too late.

[Hellmark]

Here in the US, they had a movies and music section for years.

I dunno, I guess different regions had different amount of traffic. Borders by me always seemed fairly busy, more people being in compared to B&N. Their demise was some what of a surprise to me, with the only thing I could say I understood about their downfall was their poor web presence. Borders farmed out everything online, instead of doing it themselves, which was a bad bad move.

[HomeInMyShoes]

Yes, lots of good stuff there. Thanks for the link. Borders is a victim of the corporate model. Growth for growth's sake. Investors aren't interested in a company that makes 10% a year, they are interested in companies that grow 10% every year. Sustainability is lost in that game. As the article states, "industry observers characterized the company as grasping for growth." Starbucks did this and had to scale back stores. In the book business though the large dollars sunk into inventories and into long-term leases really sank Borders.

I still love going to my bookstore. Even though all I have for options for new books is a Chapters and a small Coles in one of the malls here. I worry about them disappearing even though they are busy and profitable.

[Kevin8or]

Originally Posted by HomeInMyShoes

Investors aren't interested in a company that makes 10% a year, they are interested in companies that grow 10% every year. Sustainability is lost in that game.

^^^This^^^

A private owner can decide his profit margin is good enough, but a publicly traded company's CEO must strive for ever greater profits or else be replaced. It never ends.

[baumgar]

I think it some how reasonable, agree.

[SleepyBob]

Businesses really do have to grow to survive, though.

Expenses are always increasing. Even if you just look at employee salaries, your employee expenses go up 1%-3% a year, just to keep up with inflation, and if pay for part of their healthcare, those expenses are going up 10%+ a year.

If you don't increase your revenues, then, it's only a matter of time before you are no longer profitable. And that means either you raise prices and hope the market will bear it, or you try to expand to new areas.

[ebusinesstutor]

Very interesting article. Thank you for sharing.

I wonder what a well-run book store of the future will look like? Associates to help you download ebooks, print on demand, etc.?

[morriss003]

I love printed books. Other than my own ebooks, I only have two or three other ebooks. Waldenbooks was great. I bought books there weekly. When Waldenbooks become Borders, I bought books there also, a lot of books. I always had a membership card. But gradually Borders seemed to become disinterested in their books. They seemed to be more interested in their CD's and games, and the coffee shop and other stuff. You could see it in the way they displayed their merchandise. In the last year of Borders on Maui, I went there often. They almost never had the book I wanted and it was always difficult to find. More and more, I found myself buying from Amazon. I was not surprised when they shut their doors, I had been expecting it.

[wyndslash]

I enjoy Kinokuniya immensely whenever I'm in Singapore