COMMENT OF THE DAY: BORDERS BIDS YOU ADIEU “Do what I did at my store when they announced it was liquidating in February. Immediately unplug the wi-fi router. Immediately section-off the cafe with caution tape. Immediately move all of the seating off the sales floor. This isn’t the time to lounge around, it’s the time to buy shit and get the fuck out. It’s also not the place to take your morning shit anymore, so make sure to also permanently close the restrooms to the public.” [Chris, commenting on Borders Liquidation Sales Begin]
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Reminds me of a sign I saw on the internet, taken at a book store. It said “Bathroom closed. Try Amazon”.
.
Funny, and also made a good point. Sure we all love saving $ and shopping in our underwear, but everything comes at a cost. So we save a few bucks and shop shirtless, but when we’re driving around and seeing boarded up shops and no where to visit people in meatspace, we may wonder if it was worth it.
Funny, and also made a good point. Sure we all love saving $ and shopping in our underwear, but everything comes at a cost. So we save a few bucks and shop shirtless, but when we’re driving around and seeing boarded up shops and no where to visit people in meatspace, we may wonder if it was worth it.
B&N and all the big box book stores also make sure to include as little seating in the store as possible to keep customers from lingering too long anyway and whenever I go there, what few seating areas that were available are now all taken up by people sitting and reading through entire books anyway (which makes me think they were probably onto something to reduce those freeloaders). Bookstores are not libraries or coffee shops. They’re places to buy and move on. If you’re so offended by this, go build your own store. Nowadays I bring my books with me to cafes to do my reading and visiting.
chris …sounds bitter..hey its only a bookstore…
A-doo.
There was a time when B&N had more seating. They took that out over the years to accommodate more things that were NOT books (toys/games/looky-loos/shopping curios/etc.).
Now these places are less inviting than they should be, and as such consumers will only go there to get last minute gifts or a gift card. Rather than create comfortable areas for people to sit and read and enjoy, they created big-boxes devoid of personality. And now they are closing…at least Borders is closing…
Sad.
Hmm, Lost, first you’re demonstrably wrong in that all the bookstores do have lots of seating, even though you obviously already noticed that there are people sitting in chairs there, so I don’t know how you reached such a self-evidently contradictory conclusion.
Second of all, I could just as easily say that a coffee shop isn’t a place to linger – it’s a place to buy your coffee and move on. A restaurant isn’t a place to sit an socialize over your meal – it’s a place to put it in your face and move on. Both the restaurant and the coffeeshop would rather turn and burn you, believe me. But all three businesses – coffeeshop, restaurant, and bookstore – have figured out that they have to include an environment that is attractive to socializing in order to bring in actual, live customers. So they do.
But nobody claimed to be *offended* by the inability to sit on couches at the bookstore. Somebody missed the days when we actually saw each other’s faces while shopping, which is an entirely different phenomenon. I still run into neighbors at the local grocery store. I don’t sit down in the aisle in order to kibbitz with them for an hour, but I do suddenly remember that it’s been a while, and that I need to catch up with them later. When realspace stores make themselves neighborhood anchors, folks take for granted the fact that they’ll continue to come back. Apparently Houston Borders stores successfully did that, for the most part. It’s too bad the national chain didn’t manage the same feat.
Hmm, Lost, first you’re demonstrably wrong in that all the bookstores do have lots of seating, even though you obviously already noticed that there are people sitting in chairs there, so I don’t know how you reached such a self-evidently contradictory conclusion.
Umm, lots of seating is a nebulous concept and when I get to B&N and can’t sit down anywhere but the floor to preview a book, I would say that seating is fairly minimal. I don’t know what B&N you’ve gone to.
In any case, acting as if Amazon is killing the social arena is rediculous. If I don’t run into someone at B&N, I’ll probably run into them at the park, which I now have time to do because I didn’t have to drive to the bookstore and search for that book I’ve been looking for or see them at the cafe or restaurant where I’m enjoying my meal. Stores, while partially social venues, are really not and people will still go out into the real world even if all of the brick and morter shops are closed (which they won’t because instant gratification will always exist).
“I don’t know what B&N you’ve gone to.”
Probably the same ones as you – the ones with two squares of couches on either side of the main aisle, some folding chairs set up in front of whatever will be the evening’s author lecture, and the coffeeshop full of chairs on the right side of the store.
“In any case, acting as if Amazon is killing the social arena is rediculous.” Nobody did that. But the original poster said that basically the eventual loss of many brick and mortar stores (and if you pass by any commercial district, you *do* notice that the “for rent” signs are accumulating) will offer us that many fewer hours to be amongst people. This is a valid point, I think.
Nobody did that. But the original poster said that basically the eventual loss of many brick and mortar stores (and if you pass by any commercial district, you *do* notice that the “for rent†signs are accumulating) will offer us that many fewer hours to be amongst people. This is a valid point, I think.
And I disagree, as there are many more places to interact than stores
Probably the same ones as you – the ones with two squares of couches on either side of the main aisle, some folding chairs set up in front of whatever will be the evening’s author lecture, and the coffeeshop full of chairs on the right side of the store.
Must have missed those at the B&N on Holcombe and up in Spring at Champions Drive.