Borders Will Liquidate Remaining 399 Stores
How did Borders go from being the nation's second-biggest brick-and-mortar book chain to a bitter memory? Apparently the book, music and coffee peddler, which we can only assume bankrupted plenty of mom-and-pop stores in its day, charged ahead blindly when customers went looking for better deals online. And now 11,000 people are out of a job. (more)
How did Borders go from being the nation’s second-biggest brick-and-mortar book chain to a bitter memory? Apparently the book, music and coffee peddler, which we can only assume bankrupted plenty of mom-and-pop stores in its day, charged ahead blindly when customers went looking for better deals online. And now 11,000 people are out of a job.
It’s hard to shed a tear for a chain store, even one that tried to position itself as a funkier alternative to Barnes & Noble. This blogger’s enduring memory of Borders is a scene of union-busting captured in a Michael Moore documentary. That and unbelievably overpriced DVDs. — PZS
Your support matters…Atlanta Journal-Constitution:
Earlier this year, the 40-year-old company owed tens of millions of dollars to publishers, including $41.1 million to Penguin Putnam, $36.9 million to Hachette Book Group, $33.8 million to Simon & Schuster and $33.5 million to Random House.
Borders also suffered from a series of errors: failing to catch onto the growing importance of the Web and electronic books, not reacting quickly enough to declining music and DVD sales, and hiring four CEOs in five years without book-selling experience.
Even as the book industry shifted around it, Borders seemed to be in denial and focused on adding superstores, said Michael Norris, senior trade analyst at Simba Information.
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