Bookstores Closing, by Ken Arnold

In recent weeks, two bookstore closings have reminded us, once again, of the precarious nature of the book business. Dutton’s in Brentwood announced that it would shut its doors. According to the company’s announcement, the closing of another Dutton’s in Los Angeles made it impossible to continue. (On the other hand, a new store has opened, Skylight Books, which hopes to take up the slack.)

Just this week, I read this brief statement in Shelf Awareness:

“The Graduate Theological Union Bookstore, Berkeley, Calif., is closing by the end of the semester. The store stocks more than 12,000 titles ranging from scholarly books to books serving pastors and congregations to general religion titles.

“In an e-mail announcing the closing, manager John Seal said, ‘We fought the good fight against the chain stores and deep discount online competition and outlived many of our independent book-selling brethren, but our sales base has continued to slowly erode, and we can go on no longer.’”

It is particularly noteworthy that the GTU bookstore serves an educational community, a place where one would expect bookstores to thrive. One problem here, of course, is that seminaries in general are in trouble (because mainstream religion is in trouble). But the other problem facing GTU is the same one that faced Dutton’s and faces every independent store. And eventually will face the chains as well.

People buy books differently now. They do not assume that the local bookstore will have the book they want. And indeed the local stores do not intend to stock more than a few books (relative to the vast number published). It is not possible. Border’s has been experimenting with stores organized around themes–so-called “concept” stores–stocking even fewer books. Sales are reported to be up, however, because more books are displayed “face out,” so that buyers can see and be attracted, as bees to flowers, by the covers. These Border’s stores also have online order options for browsers who do not find the title they want.

A few weeks ago I saw a story about the Espresso Book Machine in Publishers Weekly. The machine will print books on demand right in a bookstore, allowing stores to stock, in effect, any book available through the system. Since the system accesses digital files instead of warehouses, and prints on demand, some of the key problems forcing stores like Dutton’s and GTU to close may simply go away.

The problem with the book business is not books themselves. In other words, the technology of the book does not need to change. Kindle may well succeed as a download technology, but it is not better than the book. What needs to change is the distribution system for books–and that is what Kindle really signals. Right now, distribution is a cumbersome and expensive process, requiring publishers to sell through distributors like Ingram or Baker and Taylor, and requiring publishers to accept returns. Bookstores, for their part, have to buy through these distributors and must manage inventory by returning titles that have not sold in a scandalously short period of time. A new book has only a few months to live.

On-demand printing for bookstores and direct sales to customers is the wave of the future. Technologies allowing quality printing and quick delivery already exist. Lightning Source, an on-demand print division of Ingram, already delivers tens of thousands of books every month, to stores, libraries, and other distributors.

I publish books through BookSurge and distribute through Amazon, eliminating warehouse problems and returns. (I will be adding our titles to Lightning Source soon.) That system makes it harder to work with stores, however. The Espresso Machine will help on-demand publishers reach into stores, assuming the company making the machines does not decide to serve only the mainstream publishing market or out-of-print books.

The bad news is that stores like Dutton’s and GTU are closing. The good news is that emerging systems will improve the distribution of books and make them more easier to find and buy.