{"id":3796,"date":"2010-02-28T18:47:59","date_gmt":"2010-03-01T02:47:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.candlelightstories.com\/?p=3796"},"modified":"2010-12-13T09:54:04","modified_gmt":"2010-12-13T17:54:04","slug":"kindles-and-little-bookstores","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/candlelightstories.com\/Blog\/2010\/02\/28\/kindles-and-little-bookstores\/","title":{"rendered":"Kindles and Little Bookstores"},"content":{"rendered":"

I don’t understand much about the book business.\u00a0 But I do know what makes a person want to go and be somewhere.\u00a0 I read a good blog post at The Devil’s Accountant<\/em><\/a> about the troubles small bookstores have with the existing book business and the emerging business of ebook publishing.\u00a0 Small bookstores have to purchase books at wholesale for too much money and can’t make enough profit when they sell at retail.\u00a0 That’s true.\u00a0 But most movie theaters can’t make much money selling tickets either.\u00a0 They sell candy and sodas at big markups to make good money.\u00a0 In fact, there’s no such thing as the ‘movie business.’\u00a0 There’s only a candy selling business that uses movies to bring you up to the candy counter.<\/p>\n

An important point I’d also like to make about independent and small bookstores is that most of them really suck.\u00a0 Seriously.\u00a0 Most small bookstores are just a modest room full of books on poorly built shelves.\u00a0 Dead boring.\u00a0 Nothing puts me to sleep faster than a crappy independent bookstore.\u00a0 Good riddance to them.\u00a0 Most independent bookstores can’t hold a candle to any Barnes & Noble<\/em> or a Borders<\/em>.\u00a0 Don’t open a bookstore if all you want to do is sell books.\u00a0 You’re an idiot if you do.\u00a0 And I won’t give you my money.\u00a0 I’ll give it to Amazon.\u00a0 They are not boring.\u00a0 They are smart and interesting.\u00a0 I enjoy watching them slaughter dull little bookshop owners every single day.\u00a0 It’s a fascinating and wonderful bloodbath.\u00a0 These booksellers are being eaten by lions and their screams are rare amusement.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

You need to seduce me to come into your store.\u00a0 You must woo me.\u00a0 Entice me.\u00a0 Hypnotize me.\u00a0 Romance me.\u00a0 Make me want to read inside your store and only there.\u00a0 Make me associate every good story I’ve ever read with your store and your store alone.\u00a0 It’s not easy.\u00a0 Few can do this.\u00a0 You can’t be a bookseller to do this.\u00a0 You must understand the theater.\u00a0 Drama.\u00a0 A bookseller is just a shopkeeper.\u00a0 The lowest form of business person.\u00a0 You booksellers bore me.\u00a0 You offer nothing but a cash register.\u00a0 Your little tables of new hardbacks are pathetic because they imitate.\u00a0 They do not inspire.\u00a0 My bookstore would not have a table of strategic bestsellers facing cover-out at the customers.\u00a0 It would have a model railroad.\u00a0 The customers could drive the trains.\u00a0 It would have a chalkboard or an easel where poets and artists could write, paint and rant or whatever they wanted to do.\u00a0 It would sell coffee and wine.\u00a0 There would be a popcorn popper.\u00a0 Customers could walk around with little bowls of popcorn while browsing.\u00a0 My dry cleaner does this.\u00a0 It’s genius.\u00a0 I eat popcorn every time I go to the cleaners!\u00a0 They sell hotdogs from a cart too!\u00a0 My bookstore would sell hotdogs.\u00a0 The reason my bookstore would do all these things is because I am not a boring person.\u00a0 I don’t like buying books from boring people.\u00a0 I like buying books from people who are a little crazy.\u00a0 Like Jeff Bezos.\u00a0 He’s a nut.\u00a0 That’s why Amazon is killing everybody.<\/p>\n

There’s too much business analysis going on about books.\u00a0 The solution is getting missed.\u00a0 The solution is to be a nut.\u00a0 Make a bookstore that Barnes & Noble could not hope to duplicate.\u00a0 Make a bookstore that keeps customers guessing and wondering what that crazy nut-job of a bookseller is going to do next.\u00a0 Theater.\u00a0 Keep them wondering what’s going to happen next.\u00a0 Just like a good writer.<\/p>\n

Kindles.\u00a0 Ebooks.\u00a0 Death to bookstores, right?\u00a0 Naaa.\u00a0 Come on now, you dimwitted bookstore owners, the Kindle provides you with all kinds of secret opportunities.\u00a0 Think!\u00a0 I have one.\u00a0 I’m reading one ebook after another and I get my newspapers through the thing.\u00a0 I also do my damnedest to customize my Kindle.\u00a0 I bought a leather folder to carry it in like a nice book.\u00a0 I bought a little light for it.\u00a0 I bought a silicon sleeve for it.\u00a0 What if a bookstore did all kinds of unique custom jobs for e-readers?\u00a0 My bookstore would get local artists to design cool custom e-reader jackets.\u00a0 I’d also sell ebooks.\u00a0 I’d get writers to submit their works and I’d format them as ebooks and sell them.\u00a0 I’d try to do special things like if a customer buys five print books they get a free ebook.<\/p>\n

My bookstore would also take lessons from successful small bookstores around the world.\u00a0 Look at the picture of Shakespeare & Co.<\/em> in Paris (photo from Most Interesting Bookstores of the World<\/em><\/a>).\u00a0 Their facade makes me want to walk right in.\u00a0 It’s extremely inviting.\u00a0 I have seen very few small bookstores that manage to be inviting.\u00a0 I think dullards tend to open bookstores.\u00a0 We need more exciting people selling books.\u00a0 Less whining, more nutty innovation.\u00a0 If Sarah Palin wanted to do a book signing at my store I’d place her table right next to a giant poster of her face with a line of people throwing darts at it for prizes.\u00a0 Absolutely.\u00a0 Because I’m not boring.<\/p>\n

Every once in a while a customer would open a book they’d purchased from me to find a unique one-of-a-kind artwork slipped inside.\u00a0 Surprise!\u00a0 Or a coupon for a free coffee.\u00a0 Not boring.\u00a0 Surprising.<\/p>\n

I’d show films in my bookstore too.\u00a0 I’d blow peoples’ minds with projected films in 16mm.\u00a0 Old films.\u00a0 Experimental.\u00a0 Sci-fi.\u00a0 Cult.\u00a0 Whatever.\u00a0 Not boring.<\/p>\n

Every once in a while a customer would open a book they’d purchased and find a little diatribe I’d written about the book.\u00a0 A review of sorts.\u00a0 Blow their minds.\u00a0 They’d come running back and they’d be mine all mine forever.\u00a0 You better believe it.\u00a0 I know what people want.\u00a0 I’m not boring.<\/p>\n

I’d hand out walkie-talkies to couples so they could stay in contact as they browsed my shelves.<\/p>\n

I’d lend books like a library.\u00a0 Cannibalize my own business!\u00a0 I’ll be laughing all the way to the bank.<\/p>\n

I’d make my own audio books of public domain classics.<\/p>\n

I’d make documentaries about writers, special readers, and events.\u00a0 And I’d show them in the store.<\/p>\n

I’d hold writing contests and give away book prizes and hold public readings of the winners.<\/p>\n

I’d show and sell art on my bookstore’s walls.<\/p>\n

I’d sell computer games like Dante’s Inferno<\/a><\/em> or The Path<\/em><\/a>. In fact, I’d let customers play them in my store.
\n\"\"<\/p>\n

I’d design and program my own games based on literary works just like I’ve done here on this site (see Frankenstein – The Creature Must Die<\/em><\/a>).\u00a0 Customers could play them in the store or online at home.\u00a0 Gee, maybe I should build games for bookstores.\u00a0 I wonder…<\/p>\n

I’d pay very close attention to the entire e-Ink technology.\u00a0 This is the Gutenberg press of the modern world.\u00a0 If your attention is not here, you had better sell used cars because you are a nincompoop.\u00a0 E-Ink should somehow feature in my store.\u00a0 Perhaps in as simple a way as having an e-reader available for people to play with.\u00a0 As e-Ink displays get better and bigger, I’d have at least one in my store at all times.<\/p>\n

I’d print little chapbooks and entire novels sort of like City Lights<\/em> does in San Francisco.\u00a0 Lawrence Ferlinghetti<\/em> who started City Lights is not a boring person.\u00a0 He’s interesting.\u00a0 That’s why he has a successful bookstore.<\/p>\n

I would use my amazing charm to persuade famous writers to write little books or stories just for my store.\u00a0 They’d be available nowhere else.<\/p>\n

I’d invite book censors from Iran to come and give talks about why books should be banned and why authors should be executed for insulting religions.\u00a0 Salman Rushdie<\/em><\/a> would be signing books that night.<\/p>\n

I’d invite Chinese authorities to come talk about banned books.<\/p>\n

I’d invite religious people from school districts in the U.S. to come explain why The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn<\/em><\/a> should not be read by kids.\"\"<\/p>\n

If I look at Amazon as a whole, I recognize that essentially what they have done is everything I’ve listed here.\u00a0 I don’t just look at Amazon’s book selling.\u00a0 I look at the site as an entire whole single thing.\u00a0 What does it tell me about running a bookstore?\u00a0 I do not view Amazon as a killer.\u00a0 I view Amazon as a teacher.<\/p>\n

So, finally, if you’re a boring bookstore owner and you read my post and disagree with me, close your store quickly.\u00a0 The lions are coming.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I don’t understand much about the book business.\u00a0 But I do know what makes a person want to go and be somewhere.\u00a0 I read a good blog post at The Devil’s Accountant about the troubles small bookstores have with the existing book business and the emerging business of ebook publishing.\u00a0 Small bookstores have to purchase […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[137,163],"tags":[224,971,324,243,323,972],"class_list":["post-3796","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-opinion","tag-amazon","tag-bookstore","tag-e-reader","tag-ebooks","tag-kindle","tag-retail"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/candlelightstories.com\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3796","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/candlelightstories.com\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/candlelightstories.com\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/candlelightstories.com\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/candlelightstories.com\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3796"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/candlelightstories.com\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3796\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3815,"href":"https:\/\/candlelightstories.com\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3796\/revisions\/3815"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/candlelightstories.com\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3796"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/candlelightstories.com\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3796"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/candlelightstories.com\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3796"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}