I’m going to give a shout out to Santa Barbara’s gem, Chaucer’s, which has been going strong since 1974. It survived the big boxes and Amazon. The woman who founded it recently retired and sold it to a young couple who have worked there for several years. I don’t buy books these days but I make it a point to get something there a couple times a year like a desk calendar.
I don’t think that was what was meant by “variety”- in any chain store, different locations will have different items in stock at any given time. But if Barnes and Noble just doesn’t stock a particular book - then none of the locations will have it, You’ll have to order it no matter which B&N location you go to.
You in particular might be a innocent victim , but bookstores aren’t going to be able to stay open based on a few people buying books from brick and mortar bookstores. And I’m not sure how much of it actually has to do with buying from Amazon. I used to buy probably at least 20 hardcover books a year- I read more than that but the only books I bought were the ones I really wanted to read and couldn’t get from the library for whatever reason, possibly just that I didn’t want to make multiple trips hoping they had acquired it and then filling out a request and later on , picking it up. Then it got easier - the catalog went on line and I could reserve on line. I still bought discounted books from stores, both physical and online that sold remainders. Then e-books became a thing and I got an ereader , which I greatly prefer to paper books for a lot of reasons. One of which is that I can borrow ebooks from any of the three library systems in my city. I can tag an eboook and have the library notify me when/if they acquires a copy, rather than checking the catalog every couple of weeks. The last batch of physical books I bought to read was at least ten years ago, possibly longer. ( I’ve boughgt cookbooks more recently)
Something I haven’t seen mentioned is that there are at least 2 different types of readers - one wants to keep physical books around as mementos or decor and another type just wants to read the book and doesn’t care if they have a physical object when they are done. The latter type is only going to buy a book if they have to - if they don’t have access to a library, if the library doesn’t have the book and they don’t want to wait and so on. And those people are now buying few, if any, books from anywhere.
The most attractive thing about bookstores was the browsing. Now, we all have a thing literally called a browser within arms reach 24/7. I’m surprised there are as many bookstores left as there are.
My point is – they definitely are in Germany.
I don’t think the Germans are more saintly or altruistic. That’s why the idea of legally binding fixed prices as an explanation seems plausible.
Now, I do the reverse: when I come across reference to a book I might like, I go to Amazon, read the Kindle sample to see if I would like it, then see if I can get a used hardcover on Better World Books for about the price of the Kindle edition, or order it from the indie bookstore in my town. Sometimes the only way to get it is via e-book, and then, yes, I’ll get it from Amazon, although recently I’ve been able to buy e-books directly from some authors’ websites via Bookfunnel. Bookshop.org I found useful when my town’s indie bookstore was closed for a few months while moving locations, to get the books I wanted and still support Tidal Pages.
You nailed it. I went through the same evolution.
But I went one step beyond you and have mostly stopped reading long format (e-) books altogether. So I’m not contributing to anyone’s demand for book content. Not my multiple libraries’, not Amazon’s, and not traditional B& M stores’ either.
I’m not necessarily proud of this last step, but it’s real and it has consequences for the industry.
Agreed.
But I wonder where the political motivation for the fixed pricing law came from? Decent bet it was the booksellers cartel, but beyond that it only survives because the German public is, yes, altruistic enough to not be baying for the law’s repeal in the name of lower prices and consumer choice and all the rest.
As was done in the USA back in the 1970s when there was a blanket ban on so-called “fair trade” pricing. See Fair trade law - Wikipedia and Resale price maintenance # USA - Wikipedia.
That second cite has a lot of useful discussion about the pros, cons, unintended side effects, and evolution of economists’, legislators’, and regulators’ thoughts on the topic.
Maybe “less shortsighted” is a better term for German vs American society than “more altruistic”. Either way, it’s a different social and economic attitude that manifests in a different commercial landscape. And not just about books.
I don’t think Germans are more altruistic. I’m not even sure I think they are less shortsighted. But it’s a different culture and that might matter. Maybe they don’t have free or inexpensive public libraries. Maybe Germans are more likely to prefer paper books to ebooks. Maybe they have a tradition of giving books as Christmas and birthday presents.
Germany is more densely populated than the U.S. German cities are more compact and have more public transportation than U.S. cities. It’s thus easier for Germans to walk or take a short ride on public transportation than Americans, so Germans find it easier to get to a bookstore than Americans, and they thus more often try a bookstore first than Americans.
Browsing in a bookstore and browsing online are two utterly different experiences.
Most large chains learned decades ago that having identical product in stores across the country was a money-losing proposition. You don’t sell as much snow equipment in Florida as you do in Minnesota. You sell more Italian food in New York and more Hispanic food in New Mexico. With better algorithms, even stores within a metro area learn to vary what they carry to cater to local interests and affordability.
For a while in its panic period, B&N did try to clone stock across stores. That was, predictably, a failure. Part of the recent overhaul that has given the chain some growth was to give store managers individual ability to slant their stock hyperlocally. Seems to be working.
Germany appears to have had a fixed price book culture for 150 years, although laws weren’t codified until 2002. Those are credited with creating a culture of books and bookstores, fending off internet competition, and producing more book titles per capita than the U.S.
Here is a pre-codification article with those conclusions. Here is a post-codification article making the same points. Publishers Weekly reports that in 2024 physical stores continue to maintain a large lead over online bookstores, although younger readers are the only increasing demographic.
Some of this may be attributed to the introduction of the KulturPass in 2023, which gives every German citizen €200 to spend on cultural activities, including buying books. But the trend may be short lived, as the the association reported concerns about literacy levels.
“Interest in books is high, but we are only reaching those who are functionally literate,” Schmidt-Friderichs said. “One in four children is left behind because they lack sufficient reading skills.”
Books are in danger everywhere. Society can change that if it had the will. Get them started when young seems to be the answer.
Agree completely.
You will notice my caveats about regional and SES differences. I was responding to a poster who visited two B&Ns across the same town on the same day and was surprised to find the book he wanted was absent from both.
Which doesn’t surprise me in the least; most probably the algorithm had decided neither nearly identical store with nearly identical customers would carry that particular book. The poster didn’t even make clear whether B&N online had it in their (larger) catalog.
For sure stocking algorithms aren’t magic. Their biggest shortfall, as I’ve said here on many occasions, is that they have no way to track the sales they don’t make because the product isn’t there to be sold. Whether that’s due to a temporary stock-out, or that item simply isn’t something they carry but potentially could.
Wise management takes that blind spot into account when analyzing their sales data. Dumb management either affirmatively ignores that issue as “too hard” or doesn’t even know it exists.
B&N sells books, some music, and a few gifts. Amazon sells food, clothing, appliances, tools, - in other words anything you can deliver (not booze or guns, etc). Of course Amazons sales will be more than B&N.
Yes, sure. If B&N store A has sold out, store B might still have some, and the staff is allowed to select some more specialty books from a large list.
But in general B&N has a warehouse listing of some % of the books, and that is what you might find.
Right, but with that small staff pick section as a difference.
That’s kind of my point. That there aren’t two “different brands” out there. Homogenization is the problem, not the solution.
Agree completely that homogenization is the problem.