Borders stalls book payments, doubts survival in e-book era

The problem is that bookstores charge too much money.<p>Borders will sell my book for $49 when it comes out, whereas you can preorder it from Amazon for around $22 which is about what it costs to buy the ebook copy right from the publisher. Then my book won't sell because it's too expensive, so we'll have to buy it <i>back</i> from Borders and I'll get charged against my royalties for a "return".<p>It's not e-books, it's that the prices are too high. Amazon has every book Borders has, and if I ship the thing overnight I still end up with a cheaper copy than it would cost to buy it across town.<p>Going out of business is the result of not meeting customer demand, either in terms of relevance, quality, or in this case, price.

I still buy printed books. I almost never buy any books at a major book retail store like Borders or BN because they carry very very little that I am interested in buying. They used to stock more that I was interested in, but their stock has changed over the years. I suppose they were aiming for a more middle-of-the-road, palatable-to-all sort of stock selection, but I for one have basically been driven away.<p>I initially reason, well, I must be a very unusual shopper. I buy a lot of books on programming topics, math, science, etc., and I eschew with passion anything written for dummies, idiots, fools, or morons.<p>But then I wonder, am I really so unusual? I'm not an expert historian, but I enjoy studying history, and I'm disappointed with the local store's selection of history books about as much as I am with their technology books. I enjoy studying linguistics, and have watched the store's linguistics section melt away into nothingness. I enjoy science fiction, but am dismayed to see shelves of fantasy displace books by my favorite authors.<p>I can't really speak for every subject matter, but for pretty much every topic I want to read about, the big chain bookstores seem to be dwindling their stock, and smoothing out what little they do carry to appeal to some unknown typical readership.<p>If this is indeed true of all (or even most) of the subjects of books they carry, then I find it hard to believe that anyone who truly enjoys reading books is content with what they carry. Which leaves... people who really aren't very fond of books to peruse the shelves? I don't know. It doesn't make any sense to me.<p>I would greatly enjoy doing more book shopping in person. I seem to be good enough at searching Amazon to come up with good books sight unseen, but I'd like to go browse in the store, if only the store had books in stock that I'd want to browse.

The Barnes and Noble I used to go to all the time in Manhattan will be closing January 3rd. It's really sad. The economics are fairly straightforward: <i>physical stores cannot compete with the internet for goods sold.</i> However, I'd only buy something on perhaps one-fifth of my visits. What they really had was an atmosphere, and the coffeeshop / bookstore experience is something Amazon can never sell.<p>They need to make a pivot into selling an experience, which is obviously harder to monetize than sold goods. But it's certainly possible (see: Starbucks) and it's something a lot of people are willing to pay for.

What is the future of bookselling? As much as I understand the efficiencies of Amazon, browsing through a bookstore can't be replaced by online; it's a different experience.

Sometime I wonder what would happen in the near-future?<p>Many brick-n-mortar stores (musics/cd, books, video-rental) where people used to sort of hang-out are now closing their doors and filing bankruptcy. Many young people are losing their jobs.<p>A few days ago I saw Amazon selling video games about $10 cheaper than EBGames (this particular game: Call of Duty Black Ops).<p>These are places where kids and teenagers used to hang out or even work during the summer.<p>Automation is replacing humans. Not sure if that's good or bad.<p>As much as I'd like to buy items cheaper, I'm a bit worried with the repercussion of my action.

I haven't bought a book in a store since probably 1999. I remember buying from bookpool.com when they were around and had the cheapest tech books.<p>Recently Amazon has basically dominated this market and has eaten the B&#38;M stores lunches, as far as I am concerned. The best thing Amazon ever did was launch the ratings and reviews and get tons of people to add valuable content to their site and augment the one huge disadvantage they had over B&#38;M; you can't tell if the book was any good. I find the ratings and reviews are as valuable, if not more, than me briefly looking through the book myself.<p>Now, I don't think ebooks have much to do with this at all as I don't see ebooks selling nearly as well as people think they will sell. I personally hate reading in that format and will continue to buy books to read as I find the experience much more enjoyable and maintainable. Thinks like Safari online are just AWFUL ways to consume material, IMO. The only reason I have ebooks is if I travel and want to have something to read on my iPad instead of carrying 4-6 books with me.<p>Oh yeah, and don't get me started on the price of most technical ebooks!<p>All in all...B&#38;M stores like Borders are dying b/c they couldn't or wouldn't adapt in the face of someone like Amazon who is better at the modern game than they are. This is very much like Netflix v Blockbuster...

Our local bookstore (part of a regional chain) has three times the shelf space for Manga than they do for computer books.<p>I used to like browsing in bookstores but now its like they don't want my business. Why should I have the bookstore order something for me? I pay more than Amazon and they add no value - that's why they're failing.

Starbucks should sell more books, and find the right size for their "mega store"...which would basically be the size of the old small neighborhood bookstores. They have the atmosphere similar to what people loved about old small neighborhood bookstores.

I was just telling my wife this morning that the book business has changed radically -- there's been a seismic shift in the last year.<p>I don't see how the brick-and-mortar guys are going to do it. Even if you charged more and offered a high-touch experience, folks will just come in, browse the books, then scan them on their iPhone and buy them on the net.<p>Ebooks throws an even bigger monkey wrench into the works.<p>Major changes are coming.