Borders Enters Chapter 11, Plans To Close 30% Of Stores

[marcello]

There's a Borders by my house and I've used coupons to cherry pick what they have there, but they have totally eliminated their "jazz" stock. This is a store that not having any kind of close out sale.

It's time to bid that store adieu!

[Tjazz]

The local Borders just started 60% - 80% off. Sounds like 10 days left. They still had Sprinsteens Darkness BluRay box for $52. Biographies are 80% off. There are some music biographies. No bargains in the CD section.

[trane_fanatic]

If anyone else in SF was thinking of getting a great deal on music at the closing Post/Powell or Westfield Mall stores....you probably shouldn't bother. I went to the former a few days back and got John Abercrombie's Gateway at 50% off, then made a mental note of some pricier items that I wanted to come back for once the discounts went to 60%. Went back today and found that they had indeed gone to 60% off, but the entire music stock was gone except for like 4 Christmas CDs (including one from drummer Matt Wilson, which they had like 100 copies of(!)). The Westfield store appears to be a few days behind and is still at the 50% level. There were still some CDs there but selection is very grim. On the bright side, nobody took a Sharpie to my Abercrombie CD...

My suspicion is that they are hiring the same kind of liquidation firm to run this thing as other chains use for these sales, and in this case they are not giving consumers great discounts on most stuff. Instead they are sending anything that isn't grossly overstocked around to other surviving stores rather than discount it past half off. Or maybe cutting deals with local used bookstores who buy up stuff in bulk. Pretty disappointing when I think about the haul I ended up with when Tower shut down - a couple dozen discs at 90% off!

Did anybody got to the SF Union Square store right before it closed? I drove by there today and it was shuttered for good already. I remember the last few days at the Borders near AT&T Park, the pickings were pretty forgettable and they were pretty adamant that the junk they still had would only go to 70% with no further reductions. Will try to hit up the Westfield one tomorrow before it closes too. Yes, I think they are shipping any borderline decent stuff to the ones still remaining in the Bay Area.

Edited April 18, 2011 by trane_fanatic

[Big Wheel]

My report was written 3 days before the Union Square store closed, I think. Maybe 4. Selection by that point was already miserable - if you weren't a Matt Wilson completist there was absolutely no music worth buying. The book sections were almost entirely bombed out.

I actually recommended that an artist friend check out the cheap fixtures to see if anything was worth salvaging for an art project. They were selling everything except the carpet and the paint off the walls.

[trane_fanatic]

My report was written 3 days before the Union Square store closed, I think. Maybe 4. Selection by that point was already miserable - if you weren't a Matt Wilson completist there was absolutely no music worth buying. The book sections were almost entirely bombed out.

I actually recommended that an artist friend check out the cheap fixtures to see if anything was worth salvaging for an art project. They were selling everything except the carpet and the paint off the walls.

Thanks BW! I guess I didn't miss much, if anything, then. This is in contrast to other parts of the country where, according to other message boards, folks were making out like bandits. I thought Union Square SF was going until the end of April. Guess not. Probably shipped remaining stock out to Stonestown & others. Will hit up Westfield today.

Edited April 18, 2011 by trane_fanatic

[trane_fanatic]

Stopped by Westfield yesterday. It's gone too. So much for that.

Edited April 20, 2011 by trane_fanatic

[ejp626]

I bet they don't honor the gift card I have...

I've been worried about that for a while. I have two $20 cards, and I have been trying desperately to find them for a couple of weeks, but to no avail.

Astonishingly, I'm opening boxes right after a big move, and there they are. Can't find much of anything else, but now I have my gift cards back. What's a bit annoying is that 1) they are in a box of stuff from right around the printer in the home office and I looked there several times so they should have turned up before and 2) I've missed out on a couple of 40% sales while they were missing, though there is a 33% off coupon that I will use by Monday.

[ejp626]

So it looks like the very last gasp for Borders -- Borders liquidation

What thoroughly pisses me off is that I found my gift cards and ordered three books, all of which should have been "gettable," but after pissing around for a month they inform me that they are cancelling the orders -- and they will only give me the funds back on a gift card. I've gotten two of three gift cards back, but then again can't find much of interest. I guess if I can't get it in the stores in the next week or so, then I am getting diddly/squat. Obviously not worth placing any new internet orders for anything vaguely of interest that isn't in stock.

[alankin]

"Borders says it's liquidating, shutting 399 stores."

[alankin]

Which means they are closing all of their stores. There are two Borders nearby. An nearby Barnes & Noble closed four or five years ago.

[GregK]

I did my best to keep them in business.....as a music store, at least. I even bought a decent amount of books at each of the Borders stores here over the years.

How am I supposed to browse my personal collection of e-books, anyway? It's just not the same.

[sidewinder]

This is pretty shocking - although I guess we shouldn't be that shocked. Only a few years ago it seemed that wherever you went in the US there was a sizeable Borders store. They expanded rapidly in the UK as well - although those stores were gone shortly after the financial crisis hit. I will be sorry to see them go.

[BERIGAN]

So it looks like the very last gasp for Borders -- Borders liquidation

What thoroughly pisses me off is that I found my gift cards and ordered three books, all of which should have been "gettable," but after pissing around for a month they inform me that they are cancelling the orders -- and they will only give me the funds back on a gift card. I've gotten two of three gift cards back, but then again can't find much of interest. I guess if I can't get it in the stores in the next week or so, then I am getting diddly/squat. Obviously not worth placing any new internet orders for anything vaguely of interest that isn't in stock.

The thousands of people who will lose their jobs in a terrible economy are pretty pissed off too, I imagine.

[JSngry]

Books-A-Million is no Borders, mostly a remainder outlet, but if they take the real estate and hire some of the people, it's not a total loss, although still, probably, a net one.

But you know...as e-books grow in popularity, there will be fewer remainders to sell, so that's not along-term solution, is it...

[Dan Gould]

In the mid-90s when I was living in Tallahassee, Books-A-Million became the first big-box book retailer in that two-college capital city. Then all of a sudden a Borders and a Barnes & Noble opened up, practically side-by-side and less than an eighth of a mile down the road from the Books-A-Million place.

I'm almost afraid to look to find out if the Books-A-Million location is still open and the Borders and B&N are now gone.

[BERIGAN]

Books-A-Million is no Borders, mostly a remainder outlet, but if they take the real estate and hire some of the people, it's not a total loss, although still, probably, a net one.

But you know...as e-books grow in popularity, there will be fewer remainders to sell, so that's not along-term solution, is it...

Perhaps the BAMM stores near you are more remainder outlets, but I worked at one from 04-05 and I wouldn't say they were remainder stores, 20-30% of the inventory was maybe???

Not near the "variety and Depth" as Borders used to say, of Borders. You wouldn't find untranslated French, Labor studies, or Urban planning at BAMM... of course Borders may have dropped those sections years ago, I don't know...

[GA Russell]

I read at mobileread.com that Borders had a buyer lined up and ready to go, but the publishers killed the deal because they insisted that they would not sell books to the company except on a cash up front basis, rather than the 30 day terms that are the industry standard and that everybody else gets.

[JSngry]

Books-A-Million is no Borders, mostly a remainder outlet, but if they take the real estate and hire some of the people, it's not a total loss, although still, probably, a net one.

But you know...as e-books grow in popularity, there will be fewer remainders to sell, so that's not along-term solution, is it...

Perhaps the BAMM stores near you are more remainder outlets, but I worked at one from 04-05 and I wouldn't say they were remainder stores, 20-30% of the inventory was maybe???

Not near the "variety and Depth" as Borders used to say, of Borders. You wouldn't find untranslated French, Labor studies, or Urban planning at BAMM... of course Borders may have dropped those sections years ago, I don't know...

Could be. Every one I've been in has had a huge remainder section (and a good selection of periodicals!), and a not-as-big selection of new items. Not unlike many Hastings stores' CD selections in that regard.

I also find BAM stores mostly (only?) in smaller cities, so maybe the more urban stores take a different tact?

[Teasing the Korean]

Amazon and online sales finishing off Borders is really a culmination of the very trend started by major retail chains such as Borders, which effectively finished off competitive mom and pop shops. I can't tell you how many shop owners over the years told me that they couldn't compete with Borders, Tower, Home Depot, etc.

Additionally, the larger chains killed off places that were just as much community hangouts as they were retailers - book stores, coffee shops, hardware stores, etc.

This trend is examined in a (highly recommended) book, for which, ironically, I am supplying an amazon link:

http://www.amazon.com/Great-Good-Place-Bookstores-Community/dp/1569246815/ref=sr_1_9?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1312123625&sr=1-9

[GA Russell]

TTK, perhaps related to this is the trend of shopping centers (which are private property) replacing downtowns (the public square). Years ago I was involved in politics, and we needed to collect signatures for petitions, and there were no street corners appropriate to do that.

[Teasing the Korean]

Yes, GA, the book gets into the topic of over-zealous zoning laws which have played into the phenomenon.

[Brad]

No great bargains at Borders right now. As time passes, I'm sure they'll increase, if anything is left. You're much better of with Amazon or, depending what you want, a Costco.

[GregK]

TTK, perhaps related to this is the trend of shopping centers (which are private property) replacing downtowns (the public square). Years ago I was involved in politics, and we needed to collect signatures for petitions, and there were no street corners appropriate to do that.

Opposite situation with the flagship store in Ann Arbor. Situated downtown, stand-alone store, always a lot of people using it as a hang-out in that area (especially during Art Fair week or when something good was playing at the Michigan Theater across the street that people were waiting for), and many, many times was I accosted to sign petitions in front of that store.

[medjuck]

Amazon and online sales finishing off Borders is really a culmination of the very trend started by major retail chains such as Borders, which effectively finished off competitive mom and pop shops. I can't tell you how many shop owners over the years told me that they couldn't compete with Borders, Tower, Home Depot, etc.

Additionally, the larger chains killed off places that were just as much community hangouts as they were retailers - book stores, coffee shops, hardware stores, etc.

This trend is examined in a (highly recommended) book, for which, ironically, I am supplying an amazon link:

http://www.amazon.com/Great-Good-Place-Bookstores-Community/dp/1569246815/ref=sr_1_9?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1312123625&sr=1-9

When I spent a couple of months on Kauai about 13 years ago the Border's was the community hangout. People used to hold meetings there.