In a long discussion with the Cincinnati Enquirer, Mark Wilson, CEO and new head of Joseph-Beth following its sale in bankruptcy court, provided his vision for the company as well as some history about how the bookseller got into trouble.
Joseph-Beth, which now consists of the two bookstores in Lexington, Ky., and Cincinnati as well as the hospital gift shop in the Cleveland Clinic, will aim to do things that can't be "Amazoned," Wilson said, particularly by offering live events such as author readings, school book fair fundraisers, tax prep courses, and more.
The company will also emphasize customer service, selection and ambiance as qualities that can set the store apart from online competition, Wilson continued. Immediate plans include increasing inventory, which shrank during bankruptcy, and building up the author events program.
Wilson also plans to make store improvements such as adding self-checkout machines and introducing new product lines in the bookstores that feature offerings such as lotions, aromatherapy and yoga products that have been popular at the Cleveland Clinic shop.
The company is doing its own buying again and is winnowing out titles that it used to stock despite slow sales. "We always thought, 'Build it and they will come,' but that model shifted," Wilson told the paper.
Books now account for 45% of the company's business, down from 60% in just five years. Music and DVD sales have dropped to 3% from 11%. Sales have grown in such sidelines as stationery, greeting cards, candles and Vera Bradley handbags. The Bronte Bistro now accounts for 14% of sales and serves breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Wilson does not plan to sell books or e-books online but instead focus the store's online sales efforts on gift cards and gift packages. But he does plan "to roll out another program aimed to compete with e-books on price," about which he did not provide any details.
Wilson wants eventually to add smaller stores in cities or hospitals near its existing stores. Those stores "won't be larger than 12,000 square feet," barely half the size of the smallest traditional Joseph-Beth stores, which have ranged from 25,000 to 45,000 square feet. The company is already discussing opening a second location in the Cleveland Clinic's system.
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Joseph-Beth's financial problems began in earnest after it opened stores in Pittsburgh, Pa., in 2004 and Charlotte, N.C., in 2005. The woes increased in 2009 when Joseph-Beth added a store in Fredericksburg, Va., that did not meet sales goals.
Wilson worked at General Electric for 12 years and then left in 2000 to head and restructure a technology company. He was hired by Joseph-Beth as chief operating officer in 2006 with the support of Ingram, longtime major supplier and buyer for Joseph-Beth. In the bankruptcy court bidding for Joseph-Beth in April, Wilson was part of the group led by the landlord of Joseph-Beth's Lexington, Ky., store.
The Joseph-Beth management team remained intact following the departure of co-founder and CEO Neil Van Uum after the sale. Van Uum now heads DK Booksellers, the group that owns Joseph-Beth's former Davis-Kidd location in Memphis, Tenn.
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"Instead of feeling victimized by what was happening in the marketplace, I decided to look at the value we've built up over the years and try to transfer it to other things," Books & Books owner Mitchell Kaplan told the Miami Herald. "You have to find ways to monetize the value. Otherwise, you can't stay relevant."
Besides a variety of partnerships that have been well-documented, including licensing and marketing deals for stores far from Miami, art-book publishers' in-store kiosks, as well as publishing and film production ventures, Mitchell Kaplan has "expanded his in-store cafes, doubled his special events and increased the number of ancillary items for sale like jewelry and decorative bowls. He's also started selling e-books on his website, branched into convention book sales, added more kid's book fairs and hired someone to build his corporate sales business." And sales from Books & Books cafes are about 25% of the company total. As a result, while in-store book sales are down nearly 7% since the peak before the recession, overall sales have been flat, Kaplan said.
The latest addition to Books & Books is a "smaller format" store featuring books, magazines, coffee, tea, pastries, sandwiches, cupcakes and frozen yogurt called the Newsstand by Books & Books. It's been tested at the company's Bal Harbour store (décor is "tropical garden meets literary café"), and the first stand-alone rendition will open later this summer at the Southeast Financial Center in downtown Miami.