Here Kate Whouley remembers the Waldenbooks in Needham, Mass., which is closing--a store she managed in its early days. Whouley owns Books in Common, which offers consulting services to independent booksellers, and is the author of Cottage for Sale, Must Be Moved.
Another report of a bookstore closing as the year opens: we pause, sigh
and shake our heads, perhaps offer a little prayer for the owner and
staff. For most of us--independent booksellers and supporters of
same--the closing of a small-town Waldenbooks doesn't elicit the same
sadness. Hey, it's a chain, one of a zillion bookstores in the Borders
dominion, and haven't they finished closing those tiny Waldenbooks
stores yet?
But the Waldenbooks scheduled to close in Needham, Mass., is a
neighborhood bookstore in a downtown storefront that just happens to
have corporate ownership. Wonderful booksellers have worked there, many
for long stints; until a couple of years ago, one woman I hired in 1982
was still helping customers. In the 1980s, the décor was Walden
gray--the shelves, the tables, the counter, all gunmetal gray--with a
bright blue carpet. The coolness of the store's ambiance was rescued by
the light coming through the big plate glass windows in the front of
the store. A traffic signal at the end of the block meant cars and
trucks slowed as they passed our store. Looking out those plate glass
windows one day, I saw a small truck, not much larger than a pickup,
filled up with blue Post Office letter boxes, new models, destined to
be rooted to sidewalks--where? For a moment, I was caught up in their
adventure. Then the light changed, and they were gone. It was one of
those moments when we encounter familiar objects in unfamiliar
settings, and find ourselves forced to rethink what we know about the
world. The memory of that afternoon would find its way into Cottage for
Sale, written 21 years later.
I moved to Needham from Newport, R.I., where I'd been the assistant
manager in a Waldenbooks on Bellevue Avenue. I was sent to Needham with
a mission: clean it up; and with a promise: if you get it running
smoothly, we'll give you the next big Boston store. It turned out that
my superiors were speaking literally with their instructions to clean.
This I discovered the night before I was due to start working. Using
the key I'd been given, I let myself in that Sunday while the store was
closed, thinking, "It's been open only a year--how bad can it be?" The
answer: BAD. It was unspeakably, inexplicably messy. Imagine the worst
pack-rat you know, multiply his or her tendencies by 10 or 10,000. In
addition to the daily detritus of life--opened and unopened mail,
broken Rubik's Cubes, miscellaneous, notes, keys, papers, papers,
papers, there were books arriving daily. Ah, but books can be shelved,
right? It would be correct to say books may be shelved. Or they may not
be shelved. In the bookstore I'd volunteered to clean up, there were
piles of books in front of overflowing bookcases. It was clear
immediately that merchandising had not been a priority of the previous
manager, nor, it seemed, were returns. For in addition to all those
books blocking the aisles upstairs, there were the treasures of the
basement. As large as the store itself, the basement held an inventory
equal to or exceeding the books--shelved and not--on the sales floor.
That first night, I made my beachhead: the cashwrap, as it was known in
Waldenspeak. Because the backroom was not even a room, but rather a
hallway with a desk in it, the cashwrap area was also the shipping and
receiving center for the store. It was designed so that much was hidden
from the customer--or from the unsuspecting new manager until she
turned the corner. I feel grateful
to this day that I had a witness: my boyfriend at the time, a good soul
and a fellow bookseller; his gasp was even louder than mine. Then,
sensing my rising panic, he said, "I'll help. We'll do it tonight." We
filled, if memory serves, seven brown Hefty bags with trash--everything
from crumpled tissues to empty rolls of cash register tape to an
ashtray filled with cigarette butts. "At the register!?" We were both
suitably appalled, and I decided to throw out the ashtray along with the
cigarette butts.
As we worked our way down to the gray surface of the counter, I was
already writing the Waldenbooks Action Plan in my head: No smoking on
the sales floor; All books will be shelved in sections or in the
overstock areas. I don't recall the other items on the list, but I do
remember--I think I may have actually typed out the plan onto the
triplicate Waldenbooks' forms--that the staff, when asked to read and
initial the plan to signify they intended to comply with the new rules
of order, resigned en masse. Except for the assistant manager, who
stuck around only because she'd been promised transfer to another store
if she worked under me for some unspecified period of time. It turned
out she was the smoker, and she was not fond of my rules or of me. She
made a habit of lighting her cigarette as she put on her coat in the
backroom; then she would stride across the sales floor to the front
door, trailing smoke and resentment in her wake. Eventually, I amended
the Action Plan to move all smoking outside the store, and she--just in
the nick of time--was transferred.
I have to say it puzzled me, and still does: wasn't what I was asking
of staff simply what would be asked of any bookseller in any bookstore
in America? Shelve the books, keep the counters clear, don't blow smoke
in the faces of your customers. And yet they quit, some with unkind
words. My world-weary district manager wasn't surprised: "It's better
to start fresh with your own crew." And so it was. Impossibly,
magically better. It was a great crew; friendly, efficient, pleasant,
kind. The two strongholds were Kit, a special order whiz who replaced
me as manager, and June, who remains to this day my personal paragon
of great customer service. It wasn't only that she could sell books.
June knew how to make customers feel cared for--I suspect no one would
contradict me if I were to say that hers was the vibe that kept that
store going for more than 20 years after I left town.
From that small store in the Boston suburbs, I did move to a big store
in Boston; it wasn't a Waldenbooks, but the soon-to-open six-story
Boston University Bookstore. It was a dream job that I never thought
I'd get, but somehow I did. In retrospect, I am pretty sure I was hired
principally for my youthful stamina. Seventeen hour days and heavy
lifting were not a problem. At B.U., and subsequently, at the Booksmith
and Musicsmith stores, I loved the buying independence that I had, the
ability to make decisions on a small scale without having to consult
some distant home office. I became active in NEBA and ABA, eventually
launching my own business as a consultant to independent booksellers. I
revel in the freedom that independence fosters, and I work hard to
support my clients' survival, growth and business success. But I know
that some of what I teach my clients I learned working for a chain.
When business talk turns to blanket statements about how bad the chains
are, I'm inclined to say, "There are some great people working in the
chains, and some great stores, too." And when I say it, I am thinking
of Kit and June and that tiny store on Great Plains Avenue that soon
will be no more.