We knew this was coming. And by “we” I mean, me. I knew it was coming because, honestly, this country just doesn’t read enough to support TWO national book retailer chains. I doubt, honestly, that in this day and age the country can support a single national book retail, but in any event it seems that Barnes and Noble may attempt to buy Borders.
I don’t think it would shock anyone, really, as Borders stock sits at a value of 1/3 of that of B&N’s. Plus, anyone familiar with Borders…like its employees…will tell you that over the years there has been a slow march towards making a Borders store look a lot like a B&N store.
With the likes of Amazon, and to a lesser extent, used book dealers who operate online like ABE and Alibris, both B&N and Borders have some serious competition to deal with and, probably, can’t fend off that competition on their own.