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Besides their premature international expansions, its biggest mistake I believe was closing its own online store and use Amazon for over 8 years. I mean maybe

Besides their premature international expansions, its biggest mistake I believe was closing its own online store and use Amazon for over 8 years. I mean maybe they weren't savvy enough to understand online presence at first, but it took them 8+ years to finally figure that out?

rst 16y ago
That's certainly one of them. But even in the physical book business, they were falling behind --- their inventory control systems were state of the art in the mid-1990s, but B&N leapfrogged them, while Borders management instead spent money on remodels and improved cafeterias, and trying to bring in other lines of merchandise. (It didn't help that the executives responsible for this came from retail operations like Linens n Things, and didn't know much about selling books.) More from a literary agent: [1] http://brilligblogger.blogspot.com/2010/12/borders-post-mortem.html http://brilligblogger.blogspot.com/2010/12/borders-post-mort... [2] http://brilligblogger.blogspot.com/2010/12/cold-equations.html http://brilligblogger.blogspot.com/2010/12/cold-equations.ht...
- mgkimsal 16y ago
  They were investigating selling their own wine at one point (that I know of - maybe other points too). Wine. Not... getting better at selling books or coming up with new ways to engage readers. Wine. I wrote them off at that point, and it's been painful to watch the slow decline. I liked them - I'm from SE Michigan and it was great to have a local 'home grown' company succeed. But between their early fairly major missteps in ecommerce to ceding control to Amazon for a long time, they've been in a slow death spiral. This has less to do with the shifting changes in publishing (ebooks, mobile, kindle, etc) and more to do with ... I dunno. B&N is still around and seemingly able to adapt. Why couldn't Borders?
- duck 16y ago
  I moved to place with no B&N close by and as much as I enjoy going to a bookstore I refuse to go to Borders cause it is such a lost cause to find a single book you are interested in there. It is just night and day difference browsing between the two stores.
  - colomon 16y ago
    What sort of books are you looking for?! I've got my share of complaints about Borders, and they certainly didn't always have the particular book I was looking for, but I don't think I've ever gone to one where that had absolutely no books I was interested in. Usually the problem is not spending too much money. And I've definitely never noticed B&N to be any better on that front. When I had a choice, I'd almost always go to Borders first, unless I was already in the B&N parking lot for something else.
  - mahmud 16y ago
    Are you kidding me? B&N carries books on gardening, military history and diet fads. That's about it. B&N is illiterate compared to Borders.

rst 16y ago

That's certainly one of them. But even in the physical book business, they were falling behind --- their inventory control systems were state of the art in the mid-1990s, but B&N leapfrogged them, while Borders management instead spent money on remodels and improved cafeterias, and trying to bring in other lines of merchandise. (It didn't help that the executives responsible for this came from retail operations like Linens n Things, and didn't know much about selling books.) More from a literary agent: [1] http://brilligblogger.blogspot.com/2010/12/borders-post-mortem.html http://brilligblogger.blogspot.com/2010/12/borders-post-mort... [2] http://brilligblogger.blogspot.com/2010/12/cold-equations.html http://brilligblogger.blogspot.com/2010/12/cold-equations.ht...

mgkimsal 16y ago
They were investigating selling their own wine at one point (that I know of - maybe other points too). Wine. Not... getting better at selling books or coming up with new ways to engage readers. Wine. I wrote them off at that point, and it's been painful to watch the slow decline. I liked them - I'm from SE Michigan and it was great to have a local 'home grown' company succeed. But between their early fairly major missteps in ecommerce to ceding control to Amazon for a long time, they've been in a slow death spiral. This has less to do with the shifting changes in publishing (ebooks, mobile, kindle, etc) and more to do with ... I dunno. B&N is still around and seemingly able to adapt. Why couldn't Borders?
duck 16y ago
I moved to place with no B&N close by and as much as I enjoy going to a bookstore I refuse to go to Borders cause it is such a lost cause to find a single book you are interested in there. It is just night and day difference browsing between the two stores.
- colomon 16y ago
  What sort of books are you looking for?! I've got my share of complaints about Borders, and they certainly didn't always have the particular book I was looking for, but I don't think I've ever gone to one where that had absolutely no books I was interested in. Usually the problem is not spending too much money. And I've definitely never noticed B&N to be any better on that front. When I had a choice, I'd almost always go to Borders first, unless I was already in the B&N parking lot for something else.
- mahmud 16y ago
  Are you kidding me? B&N carries books on gardening, military history and diet fads. That's about it. B&N is illiterate compared to Borders.