Comments on: A Grim Future for America’s Bookstore Chains?

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By: Victor Olivarri

Victor Olivarri — Fri, 07 May 2010 06:58:48 +0000

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By: Ethan

Ethan — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 20:56:53 +0000

“As the reading public becomes accustomed to e-readers, the market for paper books will grow smaller, limited to collectors of special editions and a dwindling sliver of customers who refuse to embrace e-reader technology.”

No way, man. Artwork fares very poorly on any of the current crop of ebook readers. Even a full size desktop computer screen displays images at 72 dpi. That’s not going to change any time soon. Compare to 150 to 300 lpi or more for printed artwork. Consider the growing importance of comics and graphic novels.

Also, there are tons of books, such as old books or non-mainstream ones that aren’t likely to ever be available for the Kindle or any other reader.

At this point I read about 1/3 of my books on the Kindle iPhone app. I’m sure that will increase, but I seriously doubt it’s going to come close to 100%.

When it comes to mass-market fiction though, you’re probably right though.

By: Matt Staggs

Matt Staggs — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 20:55:37 +0000

Thanks, Jim. I’ll look into that. I appreciate your comments.

By: Jim B

Jim B — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 19:08:24 +0000

One major error and 2 minor ones to point out.

Amazon only claimed that Kindle sales beat print sales ON Christmas day, not for the entire season. It’s easy to figure that a lot of Kindle giftees went online to get copies of books to test it with that day, so at least for now, this is a singular event.

Second, Borders U.S. had sold Borders U.K. to British investors some time ago, so its closure had nothing to do with the weakness in U.S. operations.

Finally, Pershing Square is the largest investor in Borders as well as a creditor for that $43M, but the overall debt at Borders is $375M (against a market cap of $72M). It’s easy to see why Pershing wouldn’t push to have this loan repaid while it has a major stake in the company’s overall value (17% of outstanding stock, with an option to increase that to 33%).

By: Joe M

Joe M — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 18:44:48 +0000

Much of what you wrote here is smart and forward thinking. But what is not addressed is how this does not actual help the publishing market at all. Your piece focuses on what this does to the chains. But what about the independent booksellers who frequently can not afford to offer discounted prices on any material. How does the cut rate prices affect them? I would suggest harder than the chains.
But here’s the larger problem, from my perspective: If that 60% market share of ebooks to Amazon’s Kindle figure is correct, and it may well be, do you realize the impact of that fact on the market? It’s staggering! At it’s best, B&N was about a third of market share in the U.S. Less market share on bestsellers; more on certain books they championed vs competitors, less on those their competitors championed over their selection. But 60%? That’s a monopoly in the making and having a retailer control that much of the market is not healthy for anyone, artist, publisher, etc. in the long term.