Hooked on Books
Only a few years ago, requiems were being performed over the retail book trade in the U.S. Time-consuming TV and the faster pace of modern life, feared the booksellers, would pre-empt serious reading. The book clubs with their vast mail-order lists and, most of all, the price-cutting discount houses were challenging the conventional bookstore. Leonard Schwartz, president of Manhattan-based Brentano's, predicted that many booksellers would not survive discounting.
They have not only survived-- they are thriving as never before. Sales by traditional booksellers (excluding discounters) rose 9% last year to $148 million, and this year they are expected to jump another 10% to 15%. How many of the books sold are actually read is a question beyond statistics. At any rate, booksellers, whose hardcover markup runs to 40% or better, are expecting a record fall. Brentano's Schwartz is admitting how wrong he was in a concrete way: he is doubling the size of his main store on Fifth Avenue, planning to add five more branches to the company's present 15.
Key to Survival. Americans now buy books from some 165,000 retail outlets, ranging from Chicago's giant Kroch's & Brentano's, which lists 150,000 titles, to the corner drugstores with their paperback racks. Of these outlets, 2,062 are traditional bookshops that sell both hardbacks and paperbacks, 352 are quality paperback stores (which do an $18 million-a-year business) and 882 are discount houses, department stores and supermarkets ($52 million annually). In addition, some 130 book clubs run up sales of $145 million a year, a trifling $3,000,000 below the general booksellers. Total of the annual U.S. book business, including college stores and specialized shops: $526,000,000.
The discounter has forced out a few of the smaller booksellers, but his main effect on the others has been to convince them that the key to survival is more attractive stores, better service and larger selections. A New York University survey showed that eight out of ten regular book buyers would rather pay list price in a regular bookshop than go to a discounter for the sake of the markdown. Many buyers go into a store with only a vague idea of what they want, need attentive salesmen (all too rare) to guide them to their choice. "Give me five minutes' conversation with a man about books," says Everett Noonan, manager of Martindale's in Beverly Hills, "and I can tell you what he would like and hit it on the nose just about every time."
The New York bookstores, which face the heaviest discount competition, have shown the industry how to fight back. Doubleday, whose two biggest-volume stores are within five blocks of each other on Fifth Avenue, offers a fast checking service, easy exchange of books bought at other stores, handsome wrapping and a record department. Brentano's has added ancient and modern art in original and reproduction, adult games and library furniture. Rizzoli has the elegance of an 18th century library, plans to offer browsers authentic espresso made with water imported from Italy. "Our customers are doing more than exchanging money for a book," boasts Scribner's Vice President Igor Kropotkin. "They are having a significant experience." Only twelve doors from discounting Korvette, Scribner boosted its sales 20% last year, matched Korvette's 2,000-volume sale of The Making of the President, 1964, copy for copy--despite Korvette's $2.16 discount on the $6.95 book.
Easy Transition. The book clubs are no longer the threat they once seemed --and neither, of course, are the paperbacks. Sellers say the clubs cater to many people who could not get to a bookshop, otherwise help store sales with generous advertisements in national magazines. Paperbacks, which give the seller only half the hardcover markup, have proved to bring in buyers who would never have been attracted otherwise, also introduce many younger people to serious reading. "Soon a person is going from a 75-c- novel to a $5 novel," says Joseph B. Anderson, owner of a bookshop in Larchmont, N.Y. "It's an easy transition, once they're hooked on books." Once they are hooked, cost is no barrier; hardcover prices have gone up almost as much as sales, today average $6.93, 32% more than five years ago.
The biggest growth in bookselling is occurring in the suburbs; of 149 stores opened last year, 60% were in the suburbs. "The real success stories," says Scribner's Kropotkin, "are found in the shopping centers, where stores are having to double their size overnight to accommodate the demand." Doubleday, Brentano's, and Kroch's have located most of their recent additions in suburban areas. Booksellers estimate that 40% of the population lives outside the range of present bookstores, feel that this is the area of unlimited expansion.
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