The big chairs in Borders/B&N, upscaling McDonalds: profitable? for loafs

Cafe Society
1

Reading the link about Borders, Is Borders about to go under? - Cafe Society - Straight Dope Message Board and their cost cutting actions, made me remember something that I thought of years ago: Aren’t the huge comfortable reading chairs at Barnes and Noble just a drawing card for loafs, hoboes, penniless geeks, etc? I mean, here is a book store whose purpose is to sell books, and they are giving a comfortable place so that people can read a book who haven’t paid for it. Kind of like 'why buy the cow…".
I know that some people will buy books that they have read, but, wouldn’t the target market be people that have enough money to buy the book before reading it? That didn’t come out quite right, but, I think you know what I mean.

So, I know McDonald’s is allegedly upscaling with WiFi and more high end accomodations, so that people will linger. I can maybe see this being more profitable, but is it? And, concerning B&N, Borders, that make their money on 5 dollar or more purches, aren’t they just giving more loaf space to people that won’t pay for their product anyway? Am I missing something?
ETA: Sorry about title: 1/2 way through editing it, when something came up.
Best wishes,
hh

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Every book on consuming states that the more time people stay in a store the more money they spend. It doesn’t matter if a few people take advantage of the system. The overall effect is hugely positive.

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If you just to buy a book, you might as well just order it on amazon.com and be done with it. People still go to bookstores to look but it can’t be like a supermarket for books. It needs to be more like a library with cash registers up front. That is the only chance they have. Believe it or not, most low-lifes don’t hang around bookstores, people that like books do and the more you keep them there, they more likely it is that they will buy something. I go to bookstores and read a lot more than I buy but I still buy things there. Without the chairs and the cafe, their sales from me would be near zero and that is the attraction for people that buy books regularly.