Hungry Mind News

The Future of Books

By Jay Davies

I know there is a lot of talk about the future of books and the future of bookstores. With Borders announcing bankruptcy and with Amazons Kindle and Barnes & Noble's Nook it's hard to know what the future holds for books and booksellers in general. On top of that Amazon is selling their new books well below Pub. Retail price so what's a Bookseller supposed to feel about their future.

Well there's no doubt we are in a time of great change and there's no doubt that temporarily at least it is difficult to compete with these changes, but if you can see past the short term headaches of the change I think you will see that all of these changes are in fact positive changes for the future of independent booksellers.

With the closing of Borders and with Barnes & Noble's closing many of their physical stores it will be harder and harder to find large bookstores to go to and purchase books. So where does that leave you the independent bookseller? With the Karmic closure of these chain stores in the near future the only place people will have to physically go to buy books will be independents like you. I say Karmic closures because if you might remember in the early 90's Chain stores opened up directly across from or in some cases right next to independents and drove many of them out of business. Well it's comin around and if you the independent booksellers can hold on you will be the ones who reap the benefits. After being in this business 23 years and watching the trends go up and down I feel qualified to make the statement that physical books will not in the foreseeable future be replaced by ebooks and downloads. There will always be people that want to hold an actual paper edition of a book. However having said that there will be a big shift and many people will switch to ebooks as Kindles and Nooks become more and more affordable. Right now the most inexpensive kindle is 114.00. Still quite an investment. When kindles and Nooks go down to the 29.95 range more people will try them. What does this mean to the publishers who are printing books? It means smaller press runs and eventually much higher retail prices on books and greater incentives on digital books. You see the more a publisher prints the cheaper the per unit cost is for him when printing books.

So what's this mean again to you and your future in the bookselling industry? The good news is its already happening independent bookstores are opening up at a rate of 1 a day. Chain stores are closing every day. So bottom line is that people will be seeking out bookstores and independents like you and you will thrive more and more. Of course people can still buy books online for less than they can buy from you but the vibe, ambiance, and personal service that you and your store give them they can't find from an online shopping experience. Many of you already offer discount sections and buy from discounters like myself. The other great alternatives are to buy and sell used books. In this case even if a customer could buy it on Amazon for even a penny they in most cases will simply just buy from you. First off there's no shipping charge and second of all its instant gratification no waiting. Just find your book and take it home. I believe buying and reselling used books will be a strong asset in successful bookselling now and in the future, even in stores that have only sold new books in the past.

So the future from my perspective along with the few changes looks very promising for the independent bookseller of the near future and present.

Happy Bookselling

Jay Davies
Hungry Mind Bookmart
www.hungrymindbooks.com