The final few Borders bookstores in the Washington area have begun liquidating, leaving avid readers — at least those who could look up from their eReaders — bummed out by the loss. “It’s sad, this is the only one left,” said William Ross, browsing at the Borders in Pentagon City. “Online, you buy what you need. At a bookstore, you browse around. This is going to hurt authors.”
Borders Group filed for bankruptcy in February, closing its downtown D.C. shop and many other Washington-area locations. Last week, executives of the Ann Arbor, Mich., chain announced that the 399 stores remaining nationwide would begin liquidating and close by the end of September.
“We were all working hard towards a different outcome, but … the rapidly changing book industry, eReader revolution and turbulent economy have brought us to where we are now,” Borders Group President Mike Edwards said.
Rival Barnes & Noble continues to sit pretty in three D.C. locations, as well as a dozen other spots in the Maryland and Virginia suburbs.
The company reported a record $7 billion in sales for fiscal 2011, a 20 percent increase fortified by a 50 percent boost in sales on the Barnes & Noble website.
While Barnes & Noble touts the Nook and Amazon hawks the Kindle, Borders didn’t find similar success with an eReader.
Pentagon City’s Borders bustled once the liquidation sales began. Merchandise was 40 percent off; the cafe’s furniture had disappeared.
Sisters Elizabeth and Catherine Addington sat in the aisles, reading. “Can they put a Barnes & Noble here?” Elizabeth asked.
Thinking it over, she added, “I read really slow — when I finish a big book, I want to see the accomplishment. I want to look at 700 pages.”
Washington’s independent bookstores said their clients differ from those who shopped at Borders. They don’t expect a sales increase — or bankruptcy — just because Borders is setting sail.
“It’s a loss,” said Scott Abel, the manager of Dupont Circle’s Kramerbooks & Afterwords Cafe, because “it will be replaced with a shoe store or something that doesn’t provide the same amount of culture.”
Lissa Muscatine, co-owner of Politics & Prose Bookstore, said her shop’s 27-year history and intimate community relationship prove that real books won’t disappear.
“Washington has people who are highly educated, who like to read — top universities, the federal government, major law firms,” Muscatine said. “What big spaces and online retailers can’t provide is what’s made the institution so enduring.”
