On Thu, Mar 19, 2009 at 3:28 PM, Adam Maas <a...@mawz.ca> wrote: > You mean the predatory practice of stocking a lot of books? Pricing is > not set by the bookstores but rather by publishers so predatory > pricing isn't an issue. Most of the small shops that have gone under > went under because they provided poor service and selection. And many > of the 'small bookstores' were Coles and Smithbooks anyways, which are > part of Indigo. This is often the real reason big box stores kill off > smaller stores, the smaller stores were providing poor service & > selection (and in other industries, typically poor pricing as well).
No, it's more than that. It's opening mega stores right around the corner from small bookshops, knowing they'll grind them out of business. Remember the little bookstore on the east side of Yonge just north of Bloor? Was it called Britnells? It was an upscale bookseller that had been in that same location for decades. It closed a year or two after the Indigos opened and Bay and Bloor and the Chapters opened at Bloor and Avenue. As you know, Chapters was bought out by Indigos and was owned by them at the time Britnell's (or whatever it's name was) closed. Do you remember the store right across the street from Britnell's? It was called Chapters. It was a family owned new and used book shop. It had been called Chapters at least 10 years ~prior~ to the Chapters megastore chain coming into existence. Chapters (by then owned by Indigo) took the ma and pa store to court and somehow got a court order forcing the smaller store to change their name (going against everything I know about that part of the law - I guess expensive lawyers really are worth the money). Ma and pa changed the name but went out of business about 6 months later - the cost of the lawsuit did them in. Then, shortly after ma and pa closed, Indigos closed the Chapters at Bloor and Avenue... Not predatory? Bullshit! cheers, frank -- "Sharpness is a bourgeois concept." -Henri Cartier-Bresson -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
