On Thu, Mar 19, 2009 at 4:17 PM, frank theriault <knarftheria...@gmail.com> wrote: > 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.
Yep, it's hard to compete with better selection. Small bookstores did end up closing often enough. But they closed because they provided an inferior experience (less selection, often poor service). I seriously doubt Chapters/Indigo even looked for small stores before picking their locations. Yorkville is a bloody obvious place for a large bookstore. > > 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. Yep, That's typical Reismann. Not shocked by them playing dirty pool on this (I'm very not fond of the Reismann's). But it's an atypical occurrence overall. > > Then, shortly after ma and pa closed, Indigos closed the Chapters at > Bloor and Avenue... > > Not predatory? Bullshit! > > cheers, > frank > That Chapter's location predated the merger. It was closed down because it was around the corner from the flagship Indigo location at Bay & Bloor. In fact it had been opened in the first place to compete with the Indigo location. -- M. Adam Maas http://www.mawz.ca Explorations of the City Around Us. -- 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.
