B & N expanding?

[APP]

Interesting article. However, since I don't create paperbacks and I'm still not convinced of B&N's survivability, I'll stick with D2D for distributing my e-books to them.

https://killzoneblog.com/2023/01/barnes-noble-makes-a-comeback.html

[Bill Hiatt]

It would be nice if Barnes and Noble did revive,, particularly if the individual stores had an atmosphere more like indie bookstores.

That said, I'd place more stock in how much their market share increased than in how many new stores they're opening. Sadly, Data Guy is long gone behind a pay wall, so there's no way to get even a decent estimate of that.

When I first started self-publishing (2012), BN had 20% of the US market share. By the time of Data Guy's last public report, it was 2%. The way things are now, it's hard to say whether it's inching up, and the new management thinks it would be better if it were represented in more areas, or it's opening new stores because scales have skyrocketed.

[LilyBLily]

The interesting part of the article was not the article but the comments. Most people hadn't been in a B&N in years. To survive, B&N has to reverse that trend.

[Bill Hiatt]

Indeed, the ease of online shopping has diminished the traffic to brick-and-mortar stores. However, the new CEO must have some reason to think new store openings will help counteract that trend. It isn't clear to me what data he's using to make that decision, however.

[LilyBLily]

I haven't been in a B&N in years, either.

I don't know how anyone finds a book on B&N online that isn't a featured bestseller. I find the site confusing. 

[Bill Hiatt]

I've had decent luck with the site. It also has a handy feature that tells if a title you select is available at the local Barnes and Noble. And their search results are less cluttered than Amazon's (admittedly, partly due to the fact that BN doesn't sell as wide a range of products.

I would visit the brick and mortar store, but the only one in a decent distance is at a shopping center with difficult parking. There used to be three close ones, plus four Borders stores. And that's the reason even bibliophiles in a lot of areas don't visit the stores very much. It's far less easy than it used to be. Perhaps opening more locations will help, though I doubt the 30 stores under discussion will come close to replacing all the closed locations.

[writeway]

Like many other brick & mortar companies struggling to survive, B&N wants to act as they can actually control what's going on. I don't care what the company does it will never be as successful as it was. It's just a sign of the times. Things have changed. The majority of people don't go to stores anymore, let alone bookstores. You go to stores and every one is empty. This is a universal issue for these places. It's the same for pharmacies, electronic stores (the few still around), malls, and even Walmart doesn't get the "in-store" business it once did. Let's add hardware stores to the mix. I live in the 4th largest city in America with about 4 million people in it yet most stores except the grocery stores are empty. Restaurants are full, other businesses are full. But not stores. It's just a new world.

The world is never going to be like it was when "everyone went out to the store and shopped." Sometimes, I miss those days of going into a clothing store and trying on clothes and shoes. I'm a chick so it was fun. But I don't go anywhere now except the grocery store. I order everything online now even some of my groceries. I order my medicine. My dad doesn't do anything online except when he needs to look up a company's phone number. He's in his 70s and old school I get that. But these businesses are trying to put the genie back into the bottle and don't understand this is a new generation. People can get anything they want online without leaving the house. I don't care what B&N, CVS, Target, Lowes, or any company does to change that, people are not going to suddenly start shopping in stores again. Not the majority. It's just too convenient and folks don't mind paying the shipping fees or delivery fees if they can get stuff without hassle. Walmart's even trying to MAKE people shop in stores by having some items unavailable for shipment. It's not working. All those people are doing is ordering from somewhere else.

But, yeah. I don't know. These places should've focused more on trying to adapt to the digital world instead of fighting with Amazon and maybe they'd be in a better place. B&N was years late to the table when it came to e-publishing and indies. They were in the trade publishers' pockets and doing all they could to make sure their bread-and-butter partners survived. Well, it backfired. They got swept up into a timewarp, trying to force folks to buy books THEY wanted them to buy and all that underhandedness they did with trade publishers. How they used to take bribes from different publishers, pit competing publishers against each other for visibility in the store. Not to mention how they completely locked out new trade authors to keep the "big names" on the table. B&N came along back in the late 90s and gobbled up all the mom-and-pop stores and didn't give a sh*t. So don't anybody feel sorry for them I surely don't.

For years, B&N has been hanging on by a thread and at this point, I'm like, just go already. 

I haven't been in a bookstore since 2009 probably. And Borders was my favorite anyway. Never did care much for B&N but their staff was nice. I had a few book signings there when I was with the trade pub years ago. Nothing I say is against the staff, of course, it's the company.

B&N is experiencing karma. Amazon did to them what B&N did to the little-guy stores for years. So, you reap what you sow.

I'm sorry you got a case of Goliath turning into David. That's what happens when you stomp over companies. We need to remember the lives and businesses B&N ruined years before Amazon.

I guess it sucks when you're no longer the king. 

[TimothyEllis]

Things have changed. The majority of people don't go to stores anymore, let alone bookstores. You go to stores and every one is empty. This is a universal issue for these places. It's the same for pharmacies, electronic stores (the few still around), malls, and even Walmart doesn't get the "in-store" business it once did. Let's add hardware stores to the mix. I live in the 4th largest city in America with about 4 million people in it yet most stores except the grocery stores are empty. Restaurants are full, other businesses are full. But not stores. It's just a new world.

That's not the case here.

I've had to visit the local shopping center, which is a regional hub, lately, and it's like nothing ever happened.

I'm a stand out since I'm one of the few still wearing a mask.

I'm even finding that delivery options have changed from overnight and 2 day, to a week from another state. It's like some online stores are trying to encourage people to not order online. And it's obviously working.

Just how fast we went back to the old normal really bothers me.

[Lynn]

People are social animals. No matter how many of us writers are introverts and couldn't care if we never leave the house, a great many people aren't like that.

[LilyBLily]

The middle class buys plenty online now, it's true, but customer age is not the metric that explains why Home Depot, Lowes, Walmart, Harbor Freight, Target and more are all busy. As for clothes, only some women and men can successfully buy clothes online; others need to try things on. My aunt could order a dress from a magazine ad and it would fit, but my mom couldn't because they had different body types. A guy I know who is a cyclist can't buy pants online because his thighs are so heavily muscled that typical pants cuts don't fit; guessing rather than trying things on is not efficient. And so on. I admit it was scary to wander the big Macy's in Chicago (formerly the beloved behemoth, Marshall Fields) last August and see the store basically empty of customers. Department stores appear to be on their last leg--although Macy's in Manhattan is always crowded. Are bookstores dying? Books-a-Million is holding on near me. It carries magazines and toys and has a cafe part, too, I think. It also has those tables in the main aisle that the publishers pay to place their books on. Paying for placement is alive and well. 

I also have found that the stores that would ship to me during the height of the pandemic now don't want to be as obliging. Conversely, Staples has told me they want to be more online than otherwise; repeated visits to their physical store have been disappointing because the stock and the variety are not there anymore.

tl;dr: It's not one new paradigm; it's many all at once.
 

[Post-Crisis D]

Even Amazon is getting in on the game.  There are a couple of non-Amazon stores around here where you can take your Amazon returns.  Maybe you can pick up your Amazon order too; I don't know.  There is a place around here--maybe more than one--where you can pickup your Amazon order instead of waiting for it.  We have an Amazon distribution hub here so you get things the day after, or maybe the day of, shipping, so it's not like it's a long wait.  But I guess some people want to pick it up.  Could be because of porch pirates.  If you want to be sure you get stuff, you probably either need to stay home and wait for it--and hope you hear the doorbell which I'm not even sure delivery drivers use half the time anyway--or pick it up.

[LilyBLily]

I did an Amazon return recently and all I had to do was take the item and the return QR code to the local UPS. Unwrapped. There was a long line of people doing the same.

The downside? UPS stores can be few and far between and gas is expensive. So that was the day I did about six errands within a mile of the UPS store that is 25 miles from me. Did I mention I live in the boondocks? 

[Bill Hiatt]

I don't spend a lot of time in stores myself, except for the grocery store. But I would absolutely browse in a bookstore if there was a close one with good parking. The people I know who do a lot of their own home repairs do go to the hardware store. At least some groups are definitely still using stores. LilyBLily's trying on clothes example is one I hear about all the time.

I think I mentioned in another thread that malls experienced a boost at the end of the pandemic, when people wanted to go out simply because they could.

Brick and mortar retail is never going to be what it was, but it's not going to die completely in the short-term, either. There are some people who want to physically engage with products before buying. (It's the same reason ebooks haven't completely replaced paper--bibliophiles like the sensory experiences associated with paper.) Handymen sometimes want to examine tools before buying. People making expensive electronic purchases like TVs like to see what an actual picture looks like on an actual screen.

Nor is this response an irrational one. You can learn only so much from seeing a picture of something online and reading other people's reviews of it, which are often mixed, anyway.

There is also a little nostalgia going on. Consider the example of the former Blockbuster that's now being used as a kind of museum. People come through to be reminded of what the video borrowing experience was like. In that case, it's not that anyone really wants to go back to it. But there is a feeling, maybe derived from regular family rituals and associated with pleasant experiences of the past, that we don't want to lose, either. That nostalgia isn't enough by itself to keep a business going, but don't underestimate its impact if there is also a practical reason to go shopping in person.

[TimothyEllis]

LilyBLily's trying on clothes example is one I hear about all the time.

That's the hardest to buy online.

I was trying to find summer pants a couple of years ago, and threw out 5 different ones I'd ordered because none of them fit. I'd taken a chance on them, but the sizes varied according to where they were made, and the same number had a huge variation. And several had conversion charts that proved to be absolute crap. In the end I did without.

As summer was coming on late last year I found some I thought might be okay on Amazon Aus, and actually fluked them fitting. I ordered a second pair straight away. And another 2 are on their way now, to last me the next 5 years or so.

I have found a shirts place I trust as well. But everything else? Forget it.

[Bill Hiatt]

I haven't been to a shoe store in decades, but I almost went because of a problem I was having with shoe sizes.

I actually need a wide size (more space in what I now know is called the toe box). Amazon carries those in the brand I used to use, but only for smaller sizes. (Is it really true that your feet keep growing as you get older? The size I used to use no longer fit, to the point that they cause blistering on the back of my foot.)

I kept checking options and eventually did find an appropriate shoe online. (It's from a brand called Orthofeet, so you can imagine the target demographic it's aimed at, but mercifully, the brand name is not visible on the outside of the shoe.)

I suspect this same process could have gone much faster and smoother in an actual shoe store.

[Post-Crisis D]

Mail order has been around as a business model since about the mid-1800s.  That didn't kill actual stores.

I did mail order shopping before the Internet.  It was slower because you had to mail payment, unless you placed the order by phone with a credit card, but it was convenient.

I think people like the convenience of online shopping, but the novelty wears off.  Sure, returns may be easy, but they also take extra time.  Returning stuff that doesn't fit or is defective or whatever isn't convenient.  You have to re-box it, print a label and then ship it back or take it somewhere to be shipped back.  And, sooner or later, you realize, you know, it's a lot easier to go to a store, look at something and then decide whether or not you actually want it.  You can see right then and there if a shirt has a tear or a bad sewing job, if a jacket fits, if a sheet of wood is to your liking, if that speaker is actually good or cheap plastic that photographs well, and so on.

I don't know if physical stores will ever be replaced completely, unless it's forced.

I know people are like "but the Internet changes everything!" or whatever but, in this case, I just think of mail order.  There were people (like me) that thought why bother going to a store when you can have a catalog delivered to your door and you can buy and have it delivered without ever having to waste gas going to the store or whatever?  But, still, people shopped at stores.

[LilyBLily]

Shoes! Ack! My late cousin used to shop for wide shoes in Chicago because everything in Minneapolis was for women of Scandinavian extraction with long, narrow feet. A coworker with giant feet always bought his shoes mail order because it was so hard to find his size in stores, but he often had to return them.

Not that in-store shopping is perfect, but as said above, it's far easier to judge the product if you can see it and touch it. Store buyers make a big difference in the physical shopping experience. I've noticed that certain clothing stores tend to bring in clothing that looks best on busty blondes, and other stores stock color choices that complement swarthier complexions, and so on.

To bring this back to bookstores, they used to be my favorite place in the world, but I never cared for the big box approach or found it welcoming. As a genre reader, I'm very specific in my interests, so wandering around a mammoth store and browsing all sorts of books was not my thing. Of all of them, maybe the Borders was the one I liked the most, but lounging around in a bookstore was not practical. I was too busy during that era and I had too little money to spend.

I also am quite happy that the small indie bookstores are coming back and the big stores got their comeuppance. Revenge is sweet.

[Bill Hiatt]

Borders was my favorite as well--but it's welcoming atmosphere may have been part of what killed it.

The Borders I visited most often had lots of comfortable chairs lodged in various nooks and crannies--so many that people started treating the place as a library, sitting around for hours and seemingly reading whole books. I even saw some taking notes as if doing research once. Why buy a book if you can read the whole thing in a nice, comfortable atmosphere--and even get coffee and snacks from the in-store cafe!

[alhawke]

Ah... Borders. I miss it too.

[Post-Crisis D]

I miss the Little Professor.  I guess there are some still around but I don't know if they're related or just the last stragglers or what.  The parent company's website is gone and looks to have been gone for about 9-10 years.

[She-la-te-da]

I miss good bookstores. The last time I was in B&N was summer of 2021. I'd gone to meet someone to get a doll box he was giving away, and while I waited for him I took a gander in the local store there. It was literally crammed full of junk. The aisles were filled with stacks of books and things. I turned into one aisle the same time another woman came in from the other direction. We took one look at each other and went back out. There was no way we'd make it through the crap.

I used to live in libraries and bookstores. Any kind of bookstore. If you couldn't get me at home, that's were I was. Now, I'd just as soon stay away from both. The library never has any books I want (or they're on such a long wait list I'll be dead before I get them), and bookstores don't have much of anything interesting.

Sad, but such is life. I order most things online, outside of groceries, and seldom buy clothes, so I stay home a lot. Gosh, I'm getting old.