Borders to Declare Bankruptcy

Expected as early as tomorrow. Closing 200+ stores.

Sad, but inevitable, I suppose. Lot's of large, prime spaces about to become available.

The one a block from me is open, but the space has been marketed for lease for a while now.

 

Good thing I used my gift card while I had a chance. But in a tightening market for on-site book-buying, it didn't have the juice of Barnes & Noble or B. Dalton.

 

Another industry that dismissed the power of the Internet. Can't imagine how many Borders have been built as stand-alones, or anchors of a shopping center, in the past 15 years. The one near us at the mall seems to do quite well, but who leaves their house anymore with the specific thought of "I'm going to the bookstore"?

 

I wonder what will happen to all those retail spaces. There's a huge two-story old Borders building in Phoenix that's been vacant for ages. Gorgeous space, but it has to be a bitch to try and sell or rent something that size in the current economic climate.

 

I'm near a Borders that's two years high

 

Guess I'd better get there tomorrow and hope they take my gift card.

 

Barnes and Noble bricks and mortar can't be doing well either. The one near me, built about 15 years ago, has large swaths of empty space in the store. It seems they also push a lot of cheap junk - whether that be crap toys and games to oversized photo books no one wants. All of their CDs and DVDs are ridiculously overpriced in terms of what you can find at the big box stores or online. Don't know much about their in-store cafe since I utilize the one a few doors down.

 

I thought this was about Pat Borders.

 

+1.

There is a small Borders in a strip mall in a town over from me, and even that one recently closed. It was basically the only bookstore in town for a fairly-affluent area, and seemed to do a brisk business whenever I was there. Only had one to three people working a shift, so I can't imagine non-inventory costs were high. If that place couldn't make it, I have no idea what could, outside of people running bookstores as hobbies or fun jobs after retiring from something else.

 

I enjoy going to the bookstore and looking around. But I rarely buy from a bookstore. You can almost always find it cheaper on Amazon.

I guess the bookstore's main selling point is that you can get a book immediately instead of waiting 3-4 days for shipping. Doubt that's good enough.

 

I'm one of the people who does leave the house just to go to the bookstore. I love to browse. And though I know it's not economically efficient, I'm more likely to buy a book at the bookstore than to order it online unless I can't find it in a store. Quick gratification I guess. But most likely, unless it's a book that I know I want to keep on my shelf, I'll get it from the library.

 

I'm another one who leaves just for the bookstore. In fact, we probably have more bookstore outings than restaurant outings during the week. But I, along with my wife, am a dinosaur. And I can see that everytime I go past the old 66th Street Barnes and Noble in Manhattan, which is now closed. And our current go-to place, right down the street, Borders in Columbus Circle...hopefully that survives.

At least there will always be The Strand. Right?