Nashville is about to find out that the lowest price isn’t always the best value.
NASHVILLE — Parnassus Books is normally the happiest place in Nashville, cheerful with bantering booksellers and wagging shop dogs and everybody-knows-your-name regulars and out-of-towners wearing the stunned look of a child in an endless candy aisle. But when I stopped in last week, the store was too quiet, too still. “What’s going on?” I asked Andy Brennan, the manager. He looked at me for a long moment. “Amazon is opening a store at the mall,” he finally said.
He meant the Green Hills Mall, which lies directly across the street from Parnassus. He didn’t need to tell me what it meant for Amazon to open a store there. As a writer friend of mine says, “That’s like Russia rolling in to occupy Czechoslovakia.”
Amazon may feel like a godsend to readers who live miles from the nearest bookstore or library, but to independent bookstores, Amazon is Russia, the First Galactic Empire and Voldemort all rolled into one vast, unstoppable force for destruction. Because the cost of business for small stores far exceeds that for Amazon, the online goliath has already cost far too many cherished neighborhood bookstores their lives.
Independent bookstores have responded by providing what Amazon’s business model prevents it from offering: story time for children, signed first editions, book clubs, personal recommendations by professional booksellers whose knowledge of books is both broad and deep. An independent bookstore is a crucial community center, a place to meet kindred souls and hear favorite authors talk about their new books... (continues)
He meant the Green Hills Mall, which lies directly across the street from Parnassus. He didn’t need to tell me what it meant for Amazon to open a store there. As a writer friend of mine says, “That’s like Russia rolling in to occupy Czechoslovakia.”
Amazon may feel like a godsend to readers who live miles from the nearest bookstore or library, but to independent bookstores, Amazon is Russia, the First Galactic Empire and Voldemort all rolled into one vast, unstoppable force for destruction. Because the cost of business for small stores far exceeds that for Amazon, the online goliath has already cost far too many cherished neighborhood bookstores their lives.
Independent bookstores have responded by providing what Amazon’s business model prevents it from offering: story time for children, signed first editions, book clubs, personal recommendations by professional booksellers whose knowledge of books is both broad and deep. An independent bookstore is a crucial community center, a place to meet kindred souls and hear favorite authors talk about their new books... (continues)
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But, the good news...
Physical books—which, ten or so years ago, many fretted might soon be obsolete—show no signs of going away. https://t.co/LZxSI3e6Du— The New Yorker (@NewYorker) September 1, 2019
I think there's something irreplaceable in book stores and physical books. I'm glad they're not going anywhere.
ReplyDeleteAndy Miles Section 11
DeleteMany are not going anywhere, but will be if people don't vote with their money on what they value. It is with people's decisions and preferences that dictate this outcome. It is hard to be optimistic sometimes about the future.
Absolutely that new book smell and the feeling of a unused book that’s harder to open is something unique.
DeleteIt is hard to replace physical books. I personally prefer the feel of the pages since it is much more tactile. Hopefully, independent bookstores do not meet the same fate as many small businesses did with Walmart.
ReplyDeleteEven amazon owning Kindle and Google having their digital bookstore, Physical books in my opinion will never die off. Now as a minimalist at heart, and taking a stand for the environment, Ebook readers offer so much in that field. I am torn, and have not made my final judgement call yet.
DeleteSection 11 Andy Miles
DeleteIndependent bookstores, record shops, theatres, will always have the heart of people to drive it on. I am optimistic for the best out there, but those that do not offer special services will likely be left behind unless something is done. The case of Amazon, Walmart, and Kroger, will be to see their company thrive and kill off anything that competes.
ReplyDeleteAndy Miles Section 11
DeleteI think it’s very important to keep our local bookstores alive, it’s probably the first place a kid learns about all the different kinds of books and the unlimited possibilities. In an era where there are more fast food restaurants and bars keeping the educational places alive is important.
ReplyDeleteSection 11
DeleteSection 13
DeleteI agree that it is imperative to keep local bookstores alive. Some of my fondest memories as a child are of going to small independent bookstores and just sitting down and reading in the aisles. They are experiences that I believe every child should have, and if independent bookstores disappear, those experiences disappear with them.
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ReplyDeleteIt is terrible the amount of struggle that local businesses deal with because of big names. Personally, I love going to small, local places because they worked very hard to get where they are. I am not saying this to say that Amazon did not either but now it seemingly flourishes without a concern.
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ReplyDeleteI absolutely love your comment and your thoughts. I agree we need to make our best efforts to keep these bookstores open. Send our own children there or even if we do not like reading, try it for a while and gets some books from there. It will only expand our mind and thinking.