Bronx to Lose Last Barnes and Noble Bookstore

Speaking with TJ Walker, the show where we dissect how and what world class leaders communicate. Headline in the New York Times earlier this week. Outrage in Bronx as Barnes and Noble is set to close. Bronx, which for those of you who are not a part of New York City is one of the five boroughs of New York City. It is not as glamorous as Manhattan. Most people, when you say New York City, they think of Manhattan, Central park, the Empire State Building, that's all in Manhattan. The Bronx is not a part of Manhattan Island. It has traditionally been much poorer. You think of the, the crime buildings just set on fire in the late 70s. Now truth is it's much better these days. A lot of beautiful places, crime is low. But still there's this sense of inferiority sometimes sense that it has second class citizenship within the New York City hierarchy. So the story interviewed in the Times a number of people who were upset by this. They felt almost a sense of shame for the community that the only bookstore was closed or the only general interest bookstore. There's still some specialized ones and this is a bit of a big to do. Now the Bronx is hardly the only place in America seeing bookstores go out of business. Manhattan has bookstores go out of business. But interestingly, the story did say there's still about 70 general interest bookstores in Manhattan. Where is there soon going to be? Zero. In the Bronx. And the Bronx population is vastly bigger than most towns in America. And so we're led to believe this is a bad thing. And I'm not saying it's a good thing. But I gotta tell you, sometimes technology changes and you lose something important in life and you lose some things just really were better. Playing an actual game of baseball with a real mitt is better than playing a video baseball game. It's better than a Wii baseball game. I agree with that and I don't think most people would seriously disagree. You don't see as many people watching video game baseball as you do the World Series. I say that I don't even know if there is a video game baseball league. But you get my point. But here's the thing I think people do miss. There are some things where technology just makes it better. Now I like Barnes and Noble. I love going in, strolling around. Sometimes you get two dozen books, sit out, spend an afternoon. Certainly there's been many an afternoon, many a weekend over the last 30 years when I've done that. But I haven't done that lately. Why? It's because there's a much better bookstore in the world, it's known as Amazon. Now, there's some authors out there who are going to hate me, say that I'm an author. There's some independent bookstores hate me saying that. And I've sold books in independent bookstores. I've done book signings at independent bookstores. But, folks, we have to just face facts. Amazon is a dramatically better bookstore than any brick and mortar store in the world. Yes, yes, I know. There's something about a community and having that person behind the counter, you know, like and respect, give you recommendations. But if you want recommendations, nobody's better at that than Amazon. It starts to learn your taste, your interest, what authors you like, and it recommends things that are highly relevant. When you buy a book and you like the book, and you see what other people who bought the book and liked the book are also reading, it's often highly relevant. And look, some things are always going to be better off in real life, when I have people call me up, say, D.J. i want you to teach me how to give a speech or a media interview, I always suggest doing it in person with me because that really is a better way to experience that sort of thing. But when it comes to books, there's nothing like having millions and millions of books available at your fingertips. There's no bookstore, there's no physical bookstore in the world that can do that. The average large Barnes and Noble has about 50,000 copies. When I first moved to New York City the first time way back in 1985, right out of college, I remember going to the Strand Bookstore where they talked about miles of books and maybe they have a hundred thousand books. That is such a tiny, tiny percentage what Amazon has. And you could say, well, T.J. i like the physical, tactile sense, but fine, I get. I'm not asking you not to read books, but if you're going to buy a book, I think we place a lot of undue romance on the bookstore. The bookstore is a middleman, folks. And yes, some people who own bookstores are great people, and they view themselves almost as public servants. They are essentially the librarians of some community. They're trying to elevate discourse and literacy. That's all great, it's all wonderful, but I just can't honestly say that I am filled with nostalgia and fear and worrying about bookstores going out of business when there are so many other institutions deteriorating, namely the United States Congress, the United States government. We have so many other bigger problems in the world. And let's not be US specific, global warming the international refugee crisis around. There are a lot of crises in the world. The idea that are having a harder time getting books is not one of them. It just isn't. Amazon has democratized not only book buying, but book selling. And there are a whole lot of people these days who are able to write books, sell books, sometimes make a living from books, supplement their income from books, and it absolutely would not happen from Amazon. You can spend a. And I know this because I got into the book publishing business long before Amazon ever existed. I started pushing a book to a publisher back in the 80s, late 80s. Took me about six years before I found an awful publisher for my first book. And then I remember the whole process of sort of slogging around, calling, begging independent bookstores. Had a book signing at the Intimate Book Shop in Charlotte, North Carolina where I grew up. And I had maybe two people show up. So forgive me if I don't cry about the loss of bookstores. Now if you love a really famous author and that author comes to your town and speaks at the bookstore, great experience. Guess what? You don't need a bookstore to have famous authors speak and attract a crowd. They can do it in any college, they can do it in a hotel. That has nothing to do with a book. That has something to do with the fact that people like being in a room with famous people or they like the ideas associated with the famous people. So there's certainly no documented evidence that there are fewer speaking opportunities for famous authors than before. In fact, there's never been more opportunities for authors to speak. Conferences, conventions, hotels, yes, the occasional bookstore, and of course on podcasts and webinars and a gazillion other places. So I point this out in the program today because I do think that it's certainly important to note lost arts and the ability to tell a great ghost story around a campfire I think is a nice skill. And I'd be lying if I told you I had that skill. It's just not something I've ever practiced, honed and refined. So I'm not a great teller of ghost stories. And if that art dies out, that's not a good thing. But sometimes the technology just becomes irrelevant. I grew up in a time when albums on vinyl were popular and then eight track tapes. I had eight track tapes in the mid to late 70s. You really don't hear that many people say how awful it is that we don't have eight track tapes these days it is quite fashionable to say, oh, I don't read digital books. I want the the real thing, the paper. Fine. But let's not confuse the form and the delivery packaging with the ideas. To me, what is important about books are the ideas, the actual intellectual essence, not the fact that it is printed on paper, hardback, paperback, or chiseled out of stone in tablets. The important thing is the idea. The idea and the book. And that's the beauty of digital books and the beauty of Amazon is Amazon contains more ideas than any brick and mortar bookstore in the world because it has basically every book, pretty much every book, or at least the 2 million most common books you can buy with one click on Amazon. And I know this sounds like a big advertisement for Amazon. Believe me, I'm not even an Amazon affiliate. And it's not that everything Amazon does is perfect, and it's not that I make a fortune out of my Amazon sales. But I'll tell you this, I make more money and have more consistent sales from Amazon than I do from all the bookstores in the world. And as an author, I'm not alone there. So here's my thoughts for the good people of the Bronx. Don't lament the fact that you've lost your only bookstore. If you want to improve literacy and improve public life, then encourage people to write and buy local authors books, either in person or on Amazon. Lobby your city council members, your members of Congress to build institutions of learning where people can learn to read and write. Worry about improving your schools, worry about your kids doing their homework, and maybe spend a little less time asking politicians to subsidize and give billions of dollars to owners of the New York Yankees baseball team, which is based in the Bronx. And folks, you can do both. You can enjoy sports and academics and intellectual pursuits. But when I look at how this country and a lot of countries around the world, whether it's Brazil for the Olympics or high school football teams in Texas, when I look at how easily the purse strings open for anything to do with sports, but how virtually impossible it is to send kids to a literary poetry writing camp, it makes me think we have our priorities messed up. So no, I don't believe bookstores deserve subsidies to stay up. If you're going to subsidize anyone, let's subsidize people who teach others to write. And let's subsidize writers if we have to subsidize anybody. I'm TJ Walker. I appreciate your time today. Hope you're having a great weekend. This program brought to you as always by Media Training Worldwide. If you're looking to improve your own public speaking, your own media skills. Click on the link below, get some of our free materials, get our toolkit, and you can get books, videos and audio tutorials on how to be a better speaker today. See you tomorrow. Thanks for listening to speaking with T.J. walker.