Posts
and the E-Reader killed Borders.
Borders announced recently, that despite all efforts to return to profitability or to sell the store to a company that would keep it operational; it is now having to sell the company to a liquidation company. Borders will shut the doors on its remaining 399 stores and let go its 10,700 e-employees.
Many blame this on Border's lack of a popular e-book system. Such as Amazon's Kindle, or Barnes & Noble's NookBook. While Borders did promote the Kobo, it turns out it only owned an 11% share in the company, and that Kobo, is not solely reliant on Borders to provide it with content. PC Mag reports that even though Borders is going under, Kobo is likely to keep on keeping on.
I find the whole thing kind of sad. Even though I own an e-reader, (a Kindle) most of the time I prefer real, hard copies of books. I have hundreds of books in my home and tend to reserve e-books for textbooks or newspapers or books I normally wouldn't purchase, but would read on an airplane.
I was a bigger fan of Borders than I was Barnes & Noble, and Borders always had good coupons & clearance books. I will be sad to see them go. But glad that Barnes & Noble is still holding its own, and that bookstores on the whole have not gone under completely.
Just perusing….as a fan of e-readers (although I don’t own one yet) I’m a bit confused. Although I agree with your nostalgia about the closing of a landmark like Borders, I don’t feel the pity that comes across in your post. Most solvent companies change with the times, and Borders did not. They missed the boat on the e-reader business because of lack of vision or just plain arrogance. They have been fleecing students, teacher, parents and the entire educational system for a long time. They were able to charge college students up to $300 per book when production charges are not close to that. Why? Because they were the only game in town!! There was little to no competition in the textbook industry and places like Borders took advantage of those people who could do nothing more than pay the exorbitant charges. Now e-readers and rental companies can offer the same product for a fraction of the cost. I never like to hear of businesses closing because I always think of the people who have lost their jobs. But the loss of a company who took advantage of those merely trying to educationally further themselves is no loss to me!
ReplyDelete