Comment by sbisker | Hacker News Reader

Comment by sbisker | Hacker News Reader

Oh please. I go to that bookstore all the time, and I can assure you it's not the "digital printing press" that keeps them afloat. I've never seen a single person mention it or use it.

What they are doing, and which the article really skims over, is constantly offering things that you simply can't find at Amazon. They have a comprehensive, well curated staff review section. Their "New Fiction" and "New Non-fiction" is filled with carefully selected books that people wouldn't be able to find just from looking at the NYT Best Sellers list. (Indeed, their NYT Best Sellers rack is given less than prime real estate.) They're constantly holding book signings, poetry readings and other such things to engage the community (which the article mentions quickly, in fairness). And they also have a floor dedicated entirely to used books - the only general used book store in all of Harvard Square.

The competition that Amazon crushed, B&N, Borders, and the like - they tried none of those things.

This bookstore didn't do anything more special than actually work hard to beat Amazon. Oh, and they also picked a location literally across from Harvard Yard, filled with a constantly rotating customer base with a penchant for reading. That helped too.

I'd like to see a chain really try to differentiate itself from Amazon through similar hard work - picking places where people obviously want to buy books, and offering them a great bookstore that differs from Amazon in scalable, consistent ways.

As an avid fan of Harvard Bookstore, I can say you're 100% right.

They also host philosophical society there on a quasi-weekly basis, and great people show up for quality discussion. The last time I went was for the machine intelligence chat, and who did I see across from me? Richard Stallman, ready to share his take on AI.

Harvard Bookstore is quality, that's why they're thriving.

(One more tip, they don't carry technical books, which are the ever-changing ones that I would normally order on Amazon. Good move on their part.)

Do you happen to remember what Richard Stallman said?

He was part of the conversation, not a speaker, so he wasn't necessarily talking about one theme.

> This bookstore didn't do anything more special than actually work hard to beat Amazon. Oh, and they also picked a location literally across from Harvard Yard, filled with a constantly rotating customer base with a penchant for reading and lots of disposable income. That helped too.

WordsWorth had similarly prime location and a relatively early online bookstore, IIRC. They also tried things like the Curious George tie-in. Didn't save them. The Harvard Book Store's survival is more unusual than you think.

P.S. They didn't pick the location to compete with Amazon. They were there (under previous ownership) since before Jeff Bezos was born, I believe.

The Curious George thing was confusing; it was hardly even a book store at that point. I'd argue it probably hurt them more than it helped them. But fair enough. A few bookstores have shut down around there, including ones with similarly legitimate differentiation (like that rare book store around the corner.)

Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that they picked the location to compete with Amazon. In this case, I mean "beat Amazon" to be synonymous with "surviving." Perhaps "coexist with Amazon" would have been a better way to put it.

That's the thing. In another era, I'd say that the Harvard Book Store was nothing special, but set against the carnage that has been the Boston-area bookstore scene, they're doing something right. I agree it has little or nothing to do with the digital printing press, but whatever it is, it's something a lot of other bookstores didn't crack.

Okay, this I'll believe.

I was immediately skeptical about the "printing press" mentioned in the article. Amazon has a ton of free, out of copyright books available directly for download on their site. No printing required and I don't have to leave my house.

I've used that press for a book once.

But, I will agree, I don't think I know anybody else who ever has.

Hi borski.

Really? You did? How was it? And could you get a feel while doing it for how popular the option was?

Hi sbisker. :)

Yes, I did. For an out-of-print math manuscript from Cornell. It was quick, easy, and it's sitting on my bookshelf as we speak.

To be honest, it didn't seem that popular, but I heard about it from a friend (hence how I found it, though he'd never used it), so it wasn't unknown either.

P.S. I miss you, boy.

Washington has at least three independent bookstores that seem to be doing well: Kramerbooks (Dupont Circle), Bridge Street Books (Georgetown), and Politics and Prose (Chevy Chase). Politics and Prose in particular does the "staff picks" and "new fiction/nonfiction" well. I think that they have natural constituencies, though I don't get to Bridge Street often enough to say what its is.

Kramerbooks has a cafe/restaurant attached to it that's responsible for much of its success! http://www.yelp.com/biz/kramerbooks-and-afterwords-cafe-wash...

It's a great place to bring a date, b/c you can get there early and look through the books (which are wonderfully curated, I agree!). Plus, your date will think you are smart and sophisticated!

Agreed, though I've been married long enough for the smart & sophisticated thing to have been pretty well seen through.

P&P has a cafe. Yet with $5 in caffeine & sugar giving one 45 minutes table rent, I doubt that brings much in.

For what it's worth, a lot of what they print on the book machine isn't one-offs from Google books; instead, it's small print runs for self-published authors, professors' course materials, and the like. As to seeing the machine in use, it depends when you show up, but on weekdays during academic sessions, they're pretty active with it...

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