Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by cmn32480 on Wednesday November 04 2015, @05:13AM   Printer-friendly
from the brick-and-mortar-comes-full-circle dept.

After years of slowly killing off its traditional bookstore competition, Amazon has opened its first physical bookstore at 4601 26th Ave NE, Seattle, WA:

Amazon is opening a bookshop in Seattle in a move it described as a "physical extension" of its business. It will stock the most popular books from Amazon.com, and the prices will be the same as those offered on the website. Customers will also be able to try out Amazon's devices, including the Kindle and its Fire TV. One expert questioned how much impact such a shop would have.

Amazon Books vice-president Jennifer Cast announced the online giant would open its "real, wooden doors" at the Seattle University Village on 3 November. "Amazon Books is a physical extension of Amazon.com. We've applied 20 years of online bookselling experience to build a store that integrates the benefits of offline and online book shopping," she said. The shop will stock 5,000 books in the 5,500-sq-ft (510-sq-m) space, with the majority chosen on the basis of customer ratings, pre-orders, sales, popularity on reader recommendation site Goodreads, and the shop's curators' assessments.

The BBC article shows an online customer review displayed alongside one of the books, along with a shelf featuring books rated "4.8 stars or higher".

From The Seattle Times:

Amazon is betting that the troves of data it generates from shopping patterns on its website will give it advantages in its retail location that other bookstores can't match. It will use data to pick titles that will most appeal to Seattle shoppers.

And that could also solve the business problem that has long plagued other bookstores: unsold books that gather dust on shelves and get sent back to publishers. More than most book retailers, Amazon has deep insight into customer buying habits and can stock its store with titles most likely to move.

The company will stock best-sellers, of course. But it will also include books that get the highest ratings from its customers, including little-known titles. The store will also include such categories as "Most Wished-For Cookbooks." Another section features "Award Winners, 4.5 Stars & Above, Age 6-12."


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 2) by PizzaRollPlinkett on Wednesday November 04 2015, @01:13PM

    by PizzaRollPlinkett (4512) on Wednesday November 04 2015, @01:13PM (#258347)

    Did you see the Amazon store has only 6k titles? I don't think they're after a City of Books. A normal B&N store has triple that amount in stock, let alone a City of Books with millions of titles.

    --
    (E-mail me if you want a pizza roll!)
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   2