Our local Borders Bookstore is closing. I suppose it is a victim of several different actions or inactions. You can read all about it here. When Borders announced it was planning on opening the store in downtown Santa Cruz there was a tremendous uproar about "big-box stores" moving in and taking business away from local businesses. Yes that's plural. We had at least 5 different booksellers in the area. All locally and privately owned.
About a year before Borders made their announcement another large chain bookstore came and went in less than a year. It was Crown Books. The locals made a big stink about it especially when the brash young owner from San Francisco told the press that he was "going to put Bookshop Santa Cruz out of business". Folks around here are very loyal to businesses they frequent and especially ones that represent an owner that is active in bettering the community. I don't know anyone that even went into Crown Books. If you did, you wouldn't admit it. It was a sacrilege to dishonor the other book stores. As I walked by Crown Books I'd look in to see a brightly lighted store with lots and lots of books but no one wandering the aisles.
Borders wanted to open a substantially larger store than the one finally approved. When it finally opened it suffered profanities etched on windows that didn't get broken. People caused on-going commotion at the entrance to disrupt customers and destroyed the bathrooms so badly they were rendered unusable by anyone. They remained closed to the public. A bumper sticker campaign was launched and lots of vehicles around town proudly displayed them. "Books Without Borders" they blared. The war had begun.
Borders hung on for quite a while and eventually all the hubbub died down. Alas the circle of retail life continues to roll. It was "Books Without Borders". Now it will be Borders without books.
Photo taken with my iPhone using the VideoPano app.
Please click one of the boxes below to make a quick one-word comment.
No comments:
Post a Comment