Bookstores across the country have been affected in varying degrees by the tragedies at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Some near ground zero in New York, such as the Strand Bookstore Annex and Trinity Bookshop, remained closed, and the Borders store in the World Trade Center complex was destroyed. Booksellers have had to juggle schedules and postpone or cancel events. Many are trying to deal with queries from customers that are out of the ordinary for sunny September days. Many are already putting up displays of titles that might help customers; others have memorialized the victims and their families and friends. Sales have been slowly picking up, and titles about the World Trade Center towers, the Middle East and terrorism have been popular. Titles about grief and escapist books, such as mysteries and "gentle" fiction, likewise have sold well. Because of a hoax centered on a "prediction" of the horror, books on Nostradamus sold out at many stores in the days after the crashes.
Of all booksellers, Borders perhaps was most directly affected by the events. Borders executives met with most of the 110 employees of its destroyed Trade Center store and are providing crisis counseling as well as financial and employment assistance. The company expects to find positions for the staff in other Borders and Waldenbooks stores in the New York area.
Borders was affected in other ways, too. Its store at Reagan National Airport in Virginia continues to be shut: because of its proximity to the Pentagon and downtown Washington, the airport is closed indefinitely. Borders has also canceled its semiannual general managers meeting, which is being replaced by smaller regional meetings to which people can drive.
For its part, Barnes & Noble grappled with the calamity by trying to find ways to respond collectively and individually. Chairman Len Riggio announced this past week that the company is contributing $1 million to the American Red Cross, and the Riggio Family Foundation is giving another $1 million to the City of New York's Public/Private Initiatives Fund to assist the families of lost firefighters, police and emergency rescue personnel. Both the company and foundation are matching employee contributions. B&N is also seeking ideas for "store-based" initiatives.
Airport Bind
The disaster's greatest long-term impact on a bookseller is likely to be felt by WH Smith, which owns and operates 255 airport stores and 421 hotel stores, carrying books, magazines and sundries for travelers.
Already the FAA has requested the stores remove all items that have potential to be used as weapons, such as sewing kits, manicure sets, stylus pens for Palm Pilot PDAs, even ballpoint pens. More important, new regulations allowing only ticketed passengers access to departure and arrival gates are likely to cut severely into the number of customers to WH Smith shops, many of which are located beyond security checkpoints.
Sheila Edwards, v-p of corporate affairs for WH Smith, told PW, "We're all taken aback and saddened by the events of last week. The immediate impact right now is being assessed by management. After last week, with the airports closed, we're just now trying to get back to normal." As of last week, some WH Smith stores were still closed.
"We're under contract in all our airport locations, so we can't just pick up and move," Edwards said, "Our hope is that as the federal government looks at ways to help the airline industry, there will be a trickle-down effect to the retailers."
Subdued Mood
In the first days after the tragedy, the mood at many stores was understandably bleak and tender, particularly in New York and Washington.
"With some of our more personal customers, we tend to hug and talk about things with them," said Jim Tenney, senior buyer at Olsson's Books and Records, which has seven stores in and around Washington, D.C.. "The Pentagon is so close to us, so customers are pretty shocked."
Beth Puffer, manager of the Bank Street College Bookstore in Manhattan, said, "The mood in New York is subdued." (The store closed early on Tuesday, when most of Manhattan shut down, and didn't reopen until Thursday.)
A bookseller at Books Inc., San Francisco, noted, "Customers have been more thoughtful—all the merchants are commenting on it. There's a new level of thoughtfulness and courtesy."
Likewise at Left Bank Books, St. Louis, Mo., the atmosphere was "subdued," according to bookseller Kris Kleindienst. "People are slowly going on with a semblance of a normal life," she continued, adding that "people's buying habits haven't changed," but they display "a certain patience. They're being very understanding and trying to do what they were going to be doing anyway. However, their hearts may be just a little less in it."
The first few days after the crash, the mood in the main store at Powell's, Portland, Ore., was somber, but after a few days, "it very slowly picked up," according to Jonas Johnson, operations manager.
But booksellers rallied quickly, staging mourning and healing events—and in one case, trying to provide reassurance simply by not shutting doors.
Shirley Mullin, owner of Kids Ink in Indianapolis, Ind., kept her store open last Tuesday, although she stayed alone because many of her staff returned home to take care of small children. "A lot of people around us closed, but we felt it was important to be here and be normal, just in case anyone wandered in," she said.
In one of the more remarkable stories from this terrible time, Politics & Prose, Washington, D.C., used modern technology to create overnight an event that helped customers deal with their grief. (Sadly, Politics & Prose has all the more reason to mourn: one of the store's customers, the leader of the spirituality book group, was killed on the plane that crashed into the Pentagon.)
On Thursday, Terry Tempest Williams was at the store (she was in town for an event that was canceled), and she and staff decided to hold a vigil the next evening. Immediately, the store sent out an e-mail about the vigil to 5,000 customers. Williams, the main speaker, talked for about 20 minutes, then people were asked to share whatever they wanted. "It was a very moving evening," co-owner Barbara Meade said. "We had about 250 people for it. A lot of them said that they were happy to be a part of it."
Booksellers also made heartrending displays and tried to find appropriate titles for customers.
Several Powell's Books stores created window displays that were cleared of everything but a black cloth stretched the length of the window on which there is a photo of the World Trade Center.
Bank Street College Bookstore in New York created a window display of titles describing how parents and teachers can talk to children, as well as titles on how to deal with the trauma.
Shirley Mullin at Kids Ink reported that the store has had many requests for relevant titles. "A couple of years ago, we did a bookmark about titles dealing with violence in our society, in lieu of violence in the schools. So we put those out immediately."
And booksellers tried to make a difference by donating money and blood—and in other ways.
Skylight Books in Los Angeles gave blood donors a 20% discount on books through Sunday. (Readers needed to bring their blood donation cards.)
At Quail Ridge Books, Raleigh, N.C., everyone vacated the store at noon on the Friday after the tragedy for a moment of silence. Some Quail Ridge events were canceled, but Bebe Moore Campbell drove from St. Louis (15 hours away) and arrived Friday evening in time for a 7 p.m. candlelighting observance. Some 95 fans were on hand, and Campbell spoke about the events of the week. Later that evening she was interviewed on Nightline.
Books-A-Million is distributing a pamphlet at all its stores called "A National Tragedy: Helping Children Cope—Tips for Parents and Teachers." The pamphlet, which includes a list of books to help cope with tragedy, is being distributed to schools and day-care facilities. The company is also making available meeting space in all stores to schools, community organizations and other groups for discussions about the tragedy and its aftermath.
Oklahoma City Perspective
A poignant point of view on the attack comes from Oklahoma City, site of the 1995 bombing. Connie Heppner, manager of the Full Circle Bookstore in Oklahoma City, told PW that after the bombing the store created a special section and display area on post-traumatic stress and how to talk to children. She emphasized that it was important for bookstores to put titles on display that might interest customers because often "customers didn't know they would be interested in a title until they saw it."
Heppner stressed that after Oklahoma's terrorist attack, "Everyone was changed forever." She said she is concerned that the very magnitude of the event in New York would be "overwhelming" to many.
Another Oklahoma City bookseller, David Wood, owner of Jean Barnes Books, specializing in psychology and mental health books, also emphasized the importance of displays, saying that booksellers should feature books for grief and crisis management—and get the books as quickly as possible.
Based on his experience, he estimated that booksellers should expect at least twice the normal sales for grief-related titles for about 90 days, followed by strong sales for another six months after that.
Booksellers at Jean Barnes Books report that the one major factor in the city healing itself was the willingness of the people to step out of their "personal comfort zone" and do almost anything to help. Rather than being overwhelmed, people were active and participating, asking, "What can I do? How can I help?" To that end, employees at Jean Barnes have offered to answer questions from booksellers or individuals. They are available at (800) 678-0621.
