HugoBooks has closed the Spirit of '76 ² store that it opened November 15, 2011, in a former Borders Express in Swampscott, Mass., the Salem News reported.
The paper wrote that a notice posted on the door of the store said it had closed "after a one-year trial period." John Hugo, who owns HugoBooks with his father, Robert, said in the notice, "While we regret having to make the difficult decision to close this location, we are excited to focus our energy and resources on our three remaining, long-standing bookstores. We are very optimistic about the future of independent bookstores, and are looking forward to a fantastic spring and summer.”
Robert Hugo founded Spirit of '76 in Marblehead in 1965. HugoBooks also owns the Book Rack in Newburyport and the Andover Bookstore in Andover.
When the 2,400-square-foot Swampscott store opened in 2011, John Hugo said that the Swampscott Borders Express had been one of the top-performing Borders Expresses in the country.
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At age 76 and wanting to retire, Earlene Scott is closing Scott's Book Store, Newnan, Ga., which she founded in 1976 with her late husband, Dick, according to the Times-Herald.
Scott said that "it's just time" to retire. "I love to garden. There are things I need to do at home. I'd like to do some traveling, and the only way I'm going to be able to do it is to close the bookstore."
She added that the growth of online retailers and e-books "was not a factor. It was just age and time.... I have been very lucky, that everybody has supported my downtown business," drawn in part by the store's many author events.
Scott, who owns the store's building, has one condition for new tenants: that they not paint over the murals all around the ceiling, which were created by a former employee, Michal Fetner Taylor-Phillips. One depicts Scott "surrounded by pages of books that include pictures of things that are special to her--her cat, the old Perry Street location, a beach chair and umbrella."