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Borders Books heading out?

March
20

I’ve written about small independent bookstores closing down in the lower Hudson Valley, like Merritt Bookstore in Cold Spring and Good Yarns in Hastings, but now I hear that Borders,  the publicly-traded bookstore conglomerate is  talking about major overhauls to cut its costs.

Borders Books, it seems is really looking to shut down some stores and work on e-commerce.  What ever  happened to flipping through the pages of a book and finding a great read because the book jacket just drew you in?

Reuters says that Borders suspended dividends today and its stock shares fell 30 percent. Clearly, foot traffic to get books along with the selection of music, cards and sidelines isn’t what it used to be.

According to its Web site Borders has more than 1,100 stores around the world under the name plates of  Borders, Borders International and Waldenbooks/Brentano’s. Stores in Mt. Kisco, Rye Ridge, Scarsdale besides ones ones in Manhattan, Paramus (NJ),  Danbury (Conn) and Dutchess County that draw customers from the lower Hudson Valley. Wondering what will happen to these.

Who has some good Borders finds to talk about?

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 20th, 2008 at 11:56 am by Barbara Nackman.
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2 Responses to “Borders Books heading out?”

  1. Jonathan Salem Baskin

    Hi Barbara, I agree with you, and I think that the various aspects of geophysical reality when it comes to books—tactile experience of covers, flipping pages, the smells, visual display, yadda yadda—cannot be replaced by Internet retailing. So why hasn’t Borders (or other book retailers) figured out how to exploit these un-copy-able attributes? Doing better e-commerce was never the key to succeeeding…

    Anyway, I’ve riffed a bit about what those possibilities could have been at DIM BULB, if you’re interested: http://dimbulb.typepad.com/my_weblog/2008/03/borders-reprint.html

  2. barbara nackman

    And what will happen to Border’s Books in White Plains? It is such a neat spot and I love how open the store feels.

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About this blog
Four longtime Journal News reporters share their insights about fiction, non-fiction, poetry and short stories by bringing books discussions online and exploring the local literati scene. Lots of people say they are booklovers, but Elizabeth Ganga, Barbara Livingston Nackman, Ken Valenti and Randi Weiner really are!


What they blog about
Book Notes: An ongoing chat about events, authors and news items about books, libraries, authors and everything literary from metro news reporters Barbara Livingston Nackman and Elizabeth Ganga. Barbara has been a reporter for The Journal News since 1997. She covers municipalities in Putnam County and keeps track of book events everywhere - and began her career writing about books and libraries. Lisa has been a reporter for The Journal News since 2000, after working at several newspapers in Connecticut. She has covered cities and town in sourthern and northern Westchester and is a big Jane Austen fan (though she reads everything from history to mysteries). Both reporters work out of the Mount Kisco bureau and frequently trade tidbits about books and events.


Novel Pursuits: Ken Valenti sheds light on his ongoing experiences as a novelist and poet. ÊHe talks about his trials and tribulations including musings about projects, readings, successes, and even insights into what he is reading and finds interesting. A reporter for The Journal News and its forerunners for more than 20 years, Ken now covers transportation. His first love has been writing fiction, but he's only begun pursuing that dream in recent years. He has been a reader and fiction editor for the journal Inkwell, and has published one short story in another fiction journal.


Seasoned Works: Randi Weiner dishes up an ongoing discussion about all books - old and savory. Though Randi keeps readers abreast of school issues most days and reads lots of children's and young adult books, current science fiction and murder mysteries, her overriding passion is older works generally written before 1940. She chats online about favorites and newly discovered treasures as well as book exhibits and talks related to the dusty, the musty and the marvelous illustrators of the past. She has been a reporter since 1976, with Gannett since 1989. And for the record, she says she has a personal library of more than 4,000 volumes.


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