Selling Books

Who was the B. Dalton of B. Dalton Bookseller? Nobody, it turns out. The name B. Dalton was made up because it sounded English, a spokeswoman says. B. Dalton was also chosen because it sounded like the name of the chain’s former corporate parent, Dayton Hudson Corp. The 750-store chain is now owned by Barnes & Noble.

Waldenbooks--the nation’s largest bookstore chain--opened its first outlet in a Bridgeport, Conn., department store in 1933. But the store did not really sell books--it rented them for 2 to 3 cents a day. The 1,200-unit chain, now owned by retailer K mart Corp., opened its first and now familiar mall store in Pittsburg in 1962.

And, yes, says a spokesman, Waldenbooks was named after Walden Pond of Henry David Thoreau fame.

Despite losing customers to chain operations, independent bookstores still outnumber their chain counterparts. There are 21,808 bookstores in the United States, according to the 1988-89 American Book Trade Directory. Independents number 14,066, while chains claim 7,887 outlets.

The largest group--6,561--described themselves as general bookstores, followed by religious at 3,846 and college at 3,117.

An American Book Trade Survey showed that opening a bookstore is not a way to get rich quick. The largest portion--34%--of booksellers surveyed reported sales of under $50,000. Only 5% posted sales of more than $1 million.

BOOKSTORE CHAINS’ ESTIMATED SALES

Stores as of 1987 Revenue Chain May, 1988 (millions $) Barnes & Noble/B. Dalton 1,000 950.0 Waldenbooks 1,248 800.0 Crown Books 205 168.9 Bookland Stores 101 50.0 Kroch’s and Brentano’s 17 47.0 Zondervan 83 40.0 Doubleday Book Shops 28 34.5 Lauriat’s 40 32.0 Bookstop 17 31.5 Encore 41 29.0 Cokesbury 37 22.4 Assn. of Logos Bookstores 41 14.5

Source: BP Report