medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
I occasionally hear news about Borders from former co-workers, but I
haven't heard anything particular about Borders having a serious
problem beyond that which all bookstores are experiencing thanks to
Amazon. When I was there, one facet of Border's corporate strategy
was to carry a wider backstock of books, but fewer of any individual
titles, while B&N pursued the opposite strategy (more copies of
current items, but a smaller backstock). In my opinion, Borders has
generally tended to be much better for scholarly books than B&N, but
during my time at Borders, I saw their medieval history section
shrink for 5 bays to 2, so they seem to have gradually decided to
pull away from the scholarly market and move toward a more general
market.
Andrew E. larsen
On Oct 8, 2009, at 1:38 PM, Christopher Crockett wrote:
> medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and
> culture
>
> thanks, Andrew, for the clarification.
>
> i'm certain i saw a blip go by recently on The Innernets re some
> financial
> problems with B., though i can't remember the details nor the
> source (a Barnes
> & Noble wet dream, perhaps?).
>
> the competition is getting pretty stiff --esp. in places like
> Bloomington, IN,
> where we've got a B. and a B&N going head to head in dueling strip
> malls,
> across the street from each other, only about a block and a half of
> parking
> lot separating them.
>
> that, on-line sales (of new and used), Amazon's Kindle (recently
> down-priced,
> btw, and with some serious competition from Apple coming within a
> year or so)
> thrown into the mix and i really don't see how any B&M outlets are
> surviving
> this little "economic downturn."
>
> though i hear from my socialistic, commo-fascist gubbermint that the
> "Recession" is actually "over" now.
>
> c
>
> ------ Original Message ------
> Received: Thu, 08 Oct 2009 02:19:06 PM EDT
> From: Andrew Larsen <[log in to unmask]>
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: [M-R] authoritative new source on English liturgy
>
>> medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and
>> culture
>>
>> As a former employee of Borders, I know a little more about this.
>> Full-time employees receive a 25% discount on all books and a monthly
>> book stipend (how much I don't know, but it's something on the order
>> of $50 a month). Part-time employees receive a 33% discount, but no
>> stipend. Twice a year, during a special sale, all employees receive
>> a 40% discount on all purchases. So what Borders is doing with those
>> coupons is essentially extending the 40% sale to customers in a
>> limited way. The 40% weekends were part of their system the whole
>> time I was there (from '99-'05), and I never heard any suggestion
>> that they were a financial problem for the company, so I doubt
>> Borders is any immediate danger of collapsing. They've always
>> tinkered with their discount program, so this is just a new twist
>> on it.
>>
>> Andrew E. Larsen
>>
>>
>> On Oct 8, 2009, at 1:05 PM, Christopher Crockett wrote:
>>
>>> medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and
>>> culture
>>>
>>> From: Brad Eden <[log in to unmask]>
>>>
>>>> If you join the Borders Rewards Program (which is free), they send
>>>> you out
>>> coupons on a regular basis for both store and online use to your
>>> email. They
>>> sent one out today for 40% off any one book, and Pfaff's book can
>>> be used for
>>> the discount. I just ordered my copy for $72, no shipping fees.
>>>
>>>
>>> that's interesting.
>>>
>>> 40% *used* to be the "standard" discount given by publishers to
>>> retail
>>> bookstores --for ordinary publications (not remainders, which is an
>>> whole
>>> other scam).
>>>
>>> because of its size, Borders might have negotiated a larger trade
>>> discount,
>>> but not by too much, i shouldn't think, and they can afford to
>>> offer 40% on
>>> special orders for this new title only because they are not buying
>>> this copy
>>> "on spec" (for their shelf stock), but rather have a "sure sale"
>>> for it and
>>> are really just acting as a middle man --probably having the
>>> publisher "drop
>>> ship" it directly to the customer.
>>>
>>> even so, this is a pretty slim margin, esp. considering that the
>>> shipping cost
>>> is included (about $5, or perhaps more).
>>>
>>> this is true even for a chain which is likely to go broke sometime
>>> in the
>>> (relatively) near future.
>>>
>>> c
>>>
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