In what is destined to make the purchase of eReaders just a little bit harder in Australia, Borders has announced that it is closing down all of its retail stores around the country.
The bookstore sent out an email alert this morning announcing the closure of its retail stores, along with sales of 20-40 per cent off everything in store. While that means potential savings, it also means that one of the main locations for browsing ereaders in Australia is disappearing.
On the upside, borders.com.au is apparently still in operation, offering both eBooks and eReaders for past and current customers.
Stewart Walker
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 12:13 PMhaha, bet you their 40% off price is still higher than what you can buy, ship, and GST on after buying from Amazon
Chinosts
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 12:23 PMYep totally agree… Borders were just too expensive. Australian retails are eventually going to get the message that they cannot continue to rip of the aussie consumer otherwise we will just take our business elsewhere.. Of course in the meantime they will try their best to legislate some crazy tax that makes buying stuff online more expensive…
mbryant
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 12:16 PMGood riddance.
Daniel
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 12:25 PMCan we get some more evidence of this? The borders site has not yet been updated to reflect this news:
http://www.borders.com.au/voluntary-administration-information
Greg
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 12:34 PMI am on Borders email list and just got an email that specifically says “all store locations closing”, however “It’s business as usual at borders.com.au”
TG
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 2:10 PMhttp://www.smh.com.au/business/the-end-borders-to-close-remaining-stores-20110602-1fhlq.html
Ollie
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 12:50 PMProbably because a website doesn’t have the same overheads as badly run & managed bricks & mortar stores do.
MJ
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 12:57 PMthis is a thought.
what does this mean for Angus and Robertson stores?
Scalfy
Sunday, June 5, 2011 at 2:09 PMI work (worked.?) at A&R. They’re now trying to sell individual stores off and failing that will close all doors in 6 weeks time.
Rahux
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 1:09 PMThe only one I’m concerned about it is Readers’ Feast in Melbourne which is apparently also A&G owned (their only store that didn’t carry the brand). I’ll also miss the Melbourne Central borders – but they are SO expensive.
Will
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 1:09 PMUmm ye they have been in administration for months, with stores closing and sales. This week is just when the stores are shutting their doors. A&R are going to have a similar fate.
Trjn
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 1:16 PMIt was only a matter of time.
With the exchange rate doing so well, buying a Kindle from Amazon is a great option. Finding someone to demo it for you is probably the hardest part, but once one person I knew took the plunge, it didn’t take long for most of my friends to buy one.
Paul
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 2:12 PMAgreed. The Kindle is awesome. Every serious reader I’ve shown mine to has bought one!
glennc
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 2:17 PMAmazon have AUS kindles. it really isn’t that hard and i bet they are warehoused locally. mine took 3 days from order to delivery. and book downloads take less than a minute
Sylphier
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 2:33 PMWhile digital books are all and good, I still enjoy the feeling of holding a paper book, and that feeling can never be replaced by a ereader. I agree that Borders and what not are extremely expensive, but I will dearly miss the opportunity to buy paper books from local Borders and A&R.
Rod
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 2:43 PMOnce I started using Booko.com.au, I never bought anything from Borders again
Droz
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 3:56 PM+1 booko.com.au is the single greatest discovery I’ve made on the internet!
…not that I discovered it, but it doesn’t seem to have too much traction – none of my friends had heard of it, and some of those are quite voracious buyers of books from the interwebz.
If some of you haven’t seen it before, please go and pay it a visit!
A.A.
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 5:46 PMRobina’s Borders spanned 2 stories-wonder who’ll take up the store lease
Steve
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 5:55 PMThis is pretty bad, I used to love picking up a coffee and reading a book on one of their couches.
Dan
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 6:14 PMI haven’t bought from a bricks and mortar book store for years, been using http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/
Pete Leemeijer
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 7:40 PMOK, so books bought and shipped from overseas are cheaper, and eBooks are easily accessible, but I never got the concept of freeloaders who treated Borders like a library! At least *they* loved buying a $3.50 coffee and reading a $29.00 book for free. Hope you like your new local library as much…
Stuster
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 10:03 PMI’ve been buying books exclusively online for a few years now from fishpond.com.au. It’s a fantastic local option, with amazon price match guarantee and excellent service.
Matt
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 10:23 AMThe sad thing about their ‘sales’ is that even with up to 70% as one of their stores had, the same book could be bought cheaper in Big W and it wasn’t even on sale!
Borders you shot yourself in the foot with your prices and you continue to do so as your ship slowly sinks!
Adam
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 3:26 PMTheres some perks. They fire-saled everything in store. We got 2.5k of radio gear for a couple hundred bucks :D