Downsizing the Science Fiction Section in Bookstores

[cardinal biggles]

Wow. That's pretty depressing. Maybe it just didn't sell that well in your store.

I stopped by a Borders Express the other day when I had to go to the mall for other business... thought the store was a joke. Their sci-fi section was two bays, and that was only a third of the size it used to be when they were still Waldenbooks. All of their stock seemed to be reduced in general from before the changeover. What really cracked me up was their attempt to push the whole "mini regular Borders" thing by actually having a lone comfy chair in the middle of the floor.

 

[darkwing_duck1]

People are idiots who buy movies from bookstores. Why pay $20 for a DVD at Best Buy when you can pay $30 at Barnes and Noble!

Sometimes you have better selection at the bookstore. I know it was that way with Hastings when we still had one. Lots of obscure stuff that Best Buy wouldn't order. PLUS they routinely took 10% off the top even if you didn't have the loyalty card.

 

[cardinal biggles]

^Yeah, Best Buy is great if you want the hot new releases or perennially popular titles from years past. Anything off the beaten path, though, they can't help you with.

 

[Bob The Skutter]

If anything the SF&F section at the local Waterstones seems larger than I remember. Since they put a Costa's Coffee where the SF&F section used to be, and moved it downstairs where it now takes up about 8 or so bookcases, compared to the 3 it had before. If you include horror and comic books/manga you're probably talking more like 15 bookcases.

 

[Goliath]

The SF&F section at the local Chapters seems to be holding steady, but the selection of SF has never been very good or extensive, and the ratio of Fantasy to SF has been slowly but steadily increasing.

Stocking only the most popular books and offering to order anything else sounds like a losing strategy to me. When I go to a brick-and-mortar bookstore, I'm looking for instant gratification. If I want to order a book, I'll order it online, and have it delivered to my door.

 

[Bob The Skutter]

The SF&F section at the local Chapters seems to be holding steady, but the selection of SF has never been very good or extensive, and the ratio of Fantasy to SF has been slowly but steadily increasing.

Stocking only the most popular books and offering to order anything else sounds like a losing strategy to me. When I go to a brick-and-mortar bookstore, I'm looking for instant gratification. If I want to order a book, I'll order it online, and have it delivered to my door.

That's my feeling on the matter too. If I go in to the shop, knowing I'm going to pay more for it, I want it there and then. Especially knowing I could get it next day delivery, or within a few days, and not have to wait the couple of weeks it would take them to get it in.

 

[Scout101]

Been happening for years, really. Star Trek is down to about half a shelf at this point, covering the last couple months of new releases, and that's it. Star Wars has been doing a lot better through this, and still has a lot of its 'old' catalog on the shelves...

 

[BrotherBenny]

My local Borders (I'm in North London) now has 2 shelves of Star Trek, tacked on to the end of about 24 bookcases (ie about 200 shelves) of SF&F. The local Waterstones which is a five minute walk has a third of a shelf of ST books at the end of 24 shelves of SF&F.

 

[AviTrek]

Been happening for years, really. Star Trek is down to about half a shelf at this point, covering the last couple months of new releases, and that's it. Star Wars has been doing a lot better through this, and still has a lot of its 'old' catalog on the shelves...

That's the trend I've seen. Overall SciFi/Fantasy is the same size. Star Trek is much smaller. Star Wars is larger. Doctor Who has a couple shelves. And random fantasy seems to outnumber science fiction at this point.

 

[Goliath]

My local Borders (I'm in North London) now has 2 shelves of Star Trek, tacked on to the end of about 24 bookcases (ie about 200 shelves) of SF&F. The local Waterstones which is a five minute walk has a third of a shelf of ST books at the end of 24 shelves of SF&F.

Man, I miss those London bookstores. I can't wait for my next research trip.

 

[Mistral]

Just talked to an ex-employee yesterday at Borders. Their hours were cut from 900 last year to 600 this year for March. Sad. And their sci-fi section is pathetic. Warhammer 40,000? Torchwood? I couldn't find any Ken McCleod, Alan Steele or Harry Harrison on the shelves at all, there were only 2 volumes of James P Hogan, and while they had some Harry Turtledove, none of his last 5 novels were present. On the other hand, R.A. Salvatore's D&D rip-offs were present in abundance, as well as Jim Butcher's garbage and dozens of different books about young, studly or sexy vampires. David Weber is the only scifi author making money, if you go by Borders inventory. Oh, and whatever bribes Anne McCaffrey paid the Borders executives are still in effect-she had 5, count them, 5 shelves all to herself-but I couldn't find any Poul Anderson besides a copy of Time Patrol. Screw Borders-I'm taking my business to Amazon.

 

[Scout101]

^I'm not sure I understand the math behind the hours you're mentioning. at 900 hours a year, they're working 17.3 hours a week. Cut that down to 600 hours, it's 11.5 hours a week. There's either an exaggeration in the numbers, or they're horribly over-staffed to be carrying employees that work 11 hours a week. Makes more sense to fire 3 out of every 4 people, and let the 4th guy work a 40 hour week, no?

 

[Mistral]

^I'm not sure I understand the math behind the hours you're mentioning. at 900 hours a year, they're working 17.3 hours a week. Cut that down to 600 hours, it's 11.5 hours a week. There's either an exaggeration in the numbers, or they're horribly over-staffed to be carrying employees that work 11 hours a week. Makes more sense to fire 3 out of every 4 people, and let the 4th guy work a 40 hour week, no?

Wow, I want whatever you're smoking! I said "for March", not for the year.
Perhaps I structured the sentence awkwardly.

 

[cardinal biggles]

^Not if it means they can pay those people less and not have to offer them benefits.

 

[Skywalker]

My local B&N's SF/F section is about eight rows of shelves long (well, four rows back-to-back), and as far as I can tell it's been at least that large since I first moved up here a few years ago. There's also a manga section now, which was pretty small a couple years ago, but it's expanded since then. The graphic novel section also seems to have expanded some, which is fine by me since I buy most of my TPBs from B&N. Star Wars still has a whole section to itself, about 1/4 of one row, and Star Trek takes up maybe three shelves.

 

[trekjiro]

I have noticed the comics/graphic novels & manga sections getting larger though...especially manga.

This i've totally noticed at the Bookstores i go to.
I'll have to check out the Sci-Fi sections.
In Japan, there are tons of bookstores. Its a regular place most
everyone goes to. On Friday nights, Weekends, i have seen people in an entire eisle sit
on little stools head down just reading mangas/animes for long periods...its just so popular
over there. Bigger then the movie industry. And man, do they have conventions!

 

[LaxScrutiny]

^I'm not sure I understand the math behind the hours you're mentioning. at 900 hours a year, they're working 17.3 hours a week. Cut that down to 600 hours, it's 11.5 hours a week. There's either an exaggeration in the numbers, or they're horribly over-staffed to be carrying employees that work 11 hours a week. Makes more sense to fire 3 out of every 4 people, and let the 4th guy work a 40 hour week, no?

Wow, I want whatever you're smoking! I said "for March", not for the year.
Perhaps I structured the sentence awkwardly.

I had the same confusion...

Their hours were cut from 900 last year to 600 this year for March.

It seemed like in March they were cut from 900 a year to 600 a year. I fired up my calculator and decided you meant per month, but it wasn't clear from your sentence.

I don't know what the labour laws are in your area, but here that would put the employees just a hair below full time, which would cut their benefits (if there is a group benefit plan, it only applies to full timers here) and also things like unemployment insurance premiums that the employer has to pay to the government. So the company can hire a few more part timers to fill in the hours, keep everyone else on part time, and save a lot on benefits.

 

[Mistral]

^I'm not sure I understand the math behind the hours you're mentioning. at 900 hours a year, they're working 17.3 hours a week. Cut that down to 600 hours, it's 11.5 hours a week. There's either an exaggeration in the numbers, or they're horribly over-staffed to be carrying employees that work 11 hours a week. Makes more sense to fire 3 out of every 4 people, and let the 4th guy work a 40 hour week, no?

Wow, I want whatever you're smoking! I said "for March", not for the year.
Perhaps I structured the sentence awkwardly.

I had the same confusion...

Their hours were cut from 900 last year to 600 this year for March.

It seemed like in March they were cut from 900 a year to 600 a year. I fired up my calculator and decided you meant per month, but it wasn't clear from your sentence.

I don't know what the labour laws are in your area, but here that would put the employees just a hair below full time, which would cut their benefits (if there is a group benefit plan, it only applies to full timers here) and also things like unemployment insurance premiums that the employer has to pay to the government. So the company can hire a few more part timers to fill in the hours, keep everyone else on part time, and save a lot on benefits.

Borders near me is keeping a full staff-but hacking off enough hours to turn half of them into part-timers.

 

[Sephiroth]

local hastings here carries 4 manga titles, I don't visit there often, so I am going to the B&N in Albuquerque, thier manga section is small...for now, I figure if I buy 2 manga a week there *plus I have to ORDER one a week cause they don't carry detective conan >.>) that I can get the manga section to eat the womyn power section by september

 

[Stevil2001]

io9 has run a couple articles recently about how the sf industry's been doing:
Skim through http://io9.com/tag/books/

Apparently, it's been doing pretty well, actually.