| Author | Message | ||
     Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.216 |
HMV's shares got hammered this morning after poor sales over Xmas. HMV owns Waterstones. Don't be surprised if the bookstore gets axed first . . . | ||
| Carolinec (Carolinec) Username: Carolinec Registered: 06-2009 Posted From: 92.232.199.129 |
There'd be no bookstore chain left in the UK if that happened ... and with few independent bookstores left now ... What a horrible thought, the UK without any bookshops.  | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.166.117.210 |
Waterstones is barely a bookshop these days, anyay - more like a fucking gift shop. You been in there lately? They even sell lunch boxes. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.216 |
That's because nobody's buying books from them. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.166.117.210 |
Because they can get them cheaper at Play.com. Welcome to the 'free market', people; this is our capitalist dream.  | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.216 |
I recreate the bookstore experience at home while browsing online. I put the coffee machine next to my PC and play pan pipe music on the stereo. Then every half hour or so, I get Michelle to walk along and nudge me in my leather chair, as if she's a passing customer. I don't know what folk are moaning about. They just lack imagination. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.166.117.210 |
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12117510 60 stores to close down. The poor buggers are only going to make 40-60 million profit for the year. Bless... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.216 |
Gray Friar Press is in a similar position. (Except for the "million" part of your comment, that is.) | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
Yes it's worrying. But Waterstones is by no means going to disappear. In fact the store closures are more targeted on HMV. I think that Waterstones is actually going to stick around. The vast majority of sales for publishers these days, however, is via online outlets. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.21.232.176 |
Waterstones is barely a bookshop these days, anyay - more like a fucking gift shop. It's the same in Brussels. They sell food, chocolates, honey and stuff (with all the chocolate shops in the vicinity I wish them luck!) and their fantasy/horror/science fiction section sucks something awful. There are better English bookshops in Brussels - Sterling Books, to name but one. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 88.111.142.151 |
I bought some books in Waterstones on Sunday in Sheffield but lamented the days when I used to browse for hours in Waterstones in Manchester. I don't think that I could go in that branch now. It would be too awful to taint such great memories. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.182.24.98 |
Apparently the closures are going to be forty HMV stores, and twenty Waterstones. |