The purists who didn’t like the floor space that Toys & Games took over in recent years may be gratified to see that area as one of the first cleared out.
Here we are in the very last days of my very favorite store on Earth, the Barnes & Noble on Harbison.
Its last day of operation is Tuesday… Dec. 31.
The Harbison B&N is more than a store to me. Or perhaps I should say, something other than a store. I certainly made far more purchases at other stores over the years — Food Lion, Publix, Walmart and the like.
But for me, this store was the ultimate “third place.” That’s a term I knew nothing about until recently, when I was getting ready to help conduct a brand workshop for an ADCO client, and I happened to read up on the branding strategy of Starbucks, which has from the start striven to be a “place for conversation and a sense of community. A third place between work and home.”
I enjoy both of those places, but between the two, I prefer B&N. There’s only so much you can do in a Starbucks. Noise is often a factor in the coffee shops, while B&N had a more library-like feel to it, except right around the cafe portion, where the sound of the grinder could be intrusive. And then there are all the books to browse through, which to me has always been a sort of foretaste of heaven.
I loved browsing in B&N even before I started drinking coffee in 2004. (Long story behind that. From the time I turned 30 until my 50th year, caffeine drove me nuts. Then, when I was at the Republican National Convention in New York in 2004, I started drinking coffee to deal with the 20-hour days — there was, after all, a Starbucks on every corner. And I found that it didn’t bother me anymore. In fact, it did what it was supposed to do, keeping me from dozing off and creating a nice, creative buzz.)
But to browse through those books for a couple of hours on a Saturday, enjoying my first (and second) coffees of the day — that was awesome. And if I took along my laptop and did a little blogging while I was there, well, all the better.
And yes, I did occasionally buy something. In fact, I buy most gifts there. I find it easier to imagine what sort of book someone will like than any other sort of gift, and I make a point of buying them at the actual store to show my appreciation for all the good times it affords me. Buying the gift also makes me feel less of a self-indulgent sensualist as I browse.
Anyway, I was there a couple of times over the last week or so before Christmas. The first time, I bought a book for my Dad — a biography of Omar Bradley. When I got to the counter to pay for it, the clerk asked whether I was a member. I said yes, and offered my card. It had expired (yeah, I think it was around the holidays when I renewed last year). She asked whether I wanted to renew. No, I said sadly, thinking, What would be the point?
The second time, on Christmas Eve, I found myself in Harbison with a little time on my hands, and just went in to browse once more. For nostalgia’s sake, I even put sugar in my coffee, even though I’ve been drinking it black for years. I used to use a lot of sugar back in the day, such as when I wrote this.
I was wandering through the DVD section, seeing if there were any last-minute gifts that would strike me, when one of the booksellers asked whether I needed help. I said no, but as he turned away, I asked him to wait.
I asked when the store would close. He told me — New Year’s Eve.
I asked why it was closing. He said because B&N couldn’t afford the lease, and the new tenant, Nordstrom, could.
Apologizing for intruding, I asked what he, who had worked at B&N quite a few years, was going to do. He said he might be working at the store at Richland Fashion Mall, and he urged me to come there. I said yeah, that store was OK, but it had no audio/video section. He noted pragmatically that that was the first part of the store he would expect to close, since everyone downloads music now and streams movies online.
But, feeling like an advocate trying to save a client’s life in a hopeless trial, I argued that Netflix didn’t have the high-quality, hard-to-find movies that you could buy at B&N, such as the Criterion collection of fine films. He pointed out there were other places you could get those, although no local, bricks-and-mortar location had as large a Criterion selection as B&N did.
Sigh.
I got a B&N gift card for Christmas, so I’ll probably be in there one more time before it closes for good. Maybe I’ll see you there. Maybe we can have a coffee together, with several sugars to counteract the bitterness…
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There has been no worthy bookstore in Columbia (if you don’t count Trinity Bookstore, which has limited hours) since The Happy Bookseller closed. Barnes and Noble was one of the big box bookstores which, along with Books-a-Million (are their employees even required to be literate?) led to the demise of The Happy Bookseller.
Oh, I still grieve for the Happy Bookseller. I’ve never had an employee of B&N or BooksaMillion offer assistance. I believe the folks from Happy Bookseller are the ones running the Trinity store. The BAM children’s section has been larger and better than B&N’s for a long time. Books on Broad in Camden is a good store with helpful staff.
I always felt bad about this, what with Rhett Jackson being a friend and all, but I vastly preferred Barnes & Noble to Happy Bookseller. The shop felt cramped, and the browsing opportunity was too limited.
I loved the spaciousness, the generous bounty of B&N. The more books, the merrier, say I. I loved the more famous big booksellers’ in London and Oxford when I was there — Foyles in Charing Cross Road had a whole section of British naval history; it just went on and on.
I prefer that to coziness.
Netflix has some of the more popular Criterion entries. Those that aren’t on Netflix’s list (the vast majority) are on Hulu+. Watched F for Fake the other night, fun stuff.
Yeah… I found that out right after posting this, when I went looking for a link for the reference to Criterion…
I still want my Barnes & Noble store!
I’ll miss it as well. Browsing around was always nice and there is something appealing about getting it now instead of waiting several days for Amazon.
Thomas Cooper Library sells coffee now, and you don’t need to feel guilty about not buying the books.
Nope. You can walk in. You can’t just check out books, but….
If you join the Thomas Cooper Society for $35, you can check out books from the main Cooper library (but not any of the special collections areas, of course).
Looks like B&N is just a shell from the photos. There will be no great bookstores in the Harbinson area; there’s no reason for us to make the trek to the other side of the world to visit Richland Mall, Richland Fashion Mall, whatever they call it.
Books A Million had a great technical section for computers. My wife and I could easily spend $200 during a visit. I could definitely use a book to get me up to speed on my new Canon DSLR. The user manual that came with the camera is small and doesn’t address shortcuts or techniques.
There’s nothing like being able to browse a bookstore, flip through some pages and assess if this is what is needed.
Teh innernets prolly has some useful information on your new camera….
And Nordstrom Rack is cool!
this was so long ago, but i’m so glad i found a post about this! they’re opening a new b&n in the mall, but it’s not the same 🙁 my dad and grandma used to take me here to play with the train set, get a starbucks cookie, and look for books all the time. i barely remember it but this feels very nostalgic– what a shame they replaced it with an ugly nordstrom rack! it’s always empty, too.
You are a person of excellent judgment…