Spokane Stores Prepare To Battle Book Giants

No mega-bookstore has landed in Spokane yet, but independent booksellers still are preparing for a fight.

Barnes and Noble has been scouting the Spokane area for years, but a spokesperson would not detail the bookseller’s plans last week. A spokesperson for the nation’s other industry leader, Borders Inc., also refused to comment.

But representatives of Seattle-based Sabey Corp., which owns NorthTown Mall, said earlier this month that they were negotiating with both Barnes and Noble and Borders for a superstore at the mall.

That’s enough to send Chris O’Harra into a tizzy.

“It’s so frustrating,” said the co-owner of Auntie’s Bookstore, a downtown Spokane institution with a cafe, art gallery, reading area and between 90,000 and 100,000 titles of new and used books on two floors. “They are a definite threat,” O’Harra said of the superstores. “I don’t mind competing with other bookstores in town, but it’s so unfair when you’re not in a level playing field.”

O’Harra said she and her partner, Shannon Ahern, have always known that they had to offer more than books to make their store successful. Their cafe, specialty sections, reading programs and other extras help deliver the “total experience,” O’Harra said.

“You come for the books, true, but it’s also a fun place,” she said.

But with the potential for a mega-store lurking around the corner, they’re thinking about adding more discounts, and considering other extras to make Auntie’s more competitive.

“It’s certainly put us on our toes,” O’Harra said. “It will make it much more difficult to make any kind of profit.”

Auntie’s is most likely the only bookstore in the area that will go head to head with a superstore. Other booksellers say they’ve cornered a niche in the market that should keep them afloat.

“Our niche is in books that are out of print,” said Ann Simpson, owner of Second Look Books in Lincoln Heights. “We’re leaving the new book market to those people.”

, DataTimes