They've been (in the main) good to me: friendly when I went in, happy to chat, happy to find books for me to sign.
Good luck to their employees in the future. Thanks for your support. I hope you all quickly find good jobs elsewhere. I will miss your friendly staff in the Oxford branch in particular.
6 comments:
I've been following the Borders story in the UK. Borders is big in the States but I haven't heard of any closings. Most of the news focuses on the small independents that are closing their doors. If we all bought one book a month, maybe it would help.
Whether they're big or small, independent or chains it's never good to see bookshops closing. Thanks for posting this, Eliza and hear hear to your good wishes to all Borders' staff.
Alas, two Borders stores are going out of business in my neighborhood as well. Of course, the middling-sized town of Costa Mesa had two stores, so I suppose it isn't that surprising. I don't hear anyone in the US talking about the whole chain closing up.
I like Borders, and they seem to have been pretty good to MNW books in the UK.
On the other hand, it was their major US competitor Barnes and Noble who decided to carry my book over here, and Borders never did. I must confess that made my like Barnes and Noble more and Borders a bit less. But that feeling is restricted to the sotres in the US.
And Borders (with WH Smith) turned down the cover for my paperback...
The Brighton Borders was one of my favourite bookshops, and carried the best range of MNW titles I have seen anywhere.
Regrettably we are getting to the stage where the UK can support only one national high-street retailer. And I fear for the long term future of Waterstones, under threat not only from Amazon, but also supermarkets. Who can compete with Tesco given that they can afford to sell books at a loss? Whoever saw an MNW title in Tesco or Sainsbury?
I've just been to our local Borders on their last day of trading. Very sad to see the shelves half bare and the books scattered everywhere. If you want to look on the bright side, then the closure of Borders should help the independent book shops, but from the writers' (and book buyers') point of view all bookshop closures are bad news.
The UK and US Borders operations are completely separate, by the way, so there should be no knock-on effect in the US.
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