UK: Borders Books (UK) has gone into administration...

...and will be closing down its UK stores.  More:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8385117.stm

News reports indicate that a closing down sale has begun.  Bad news for Borders and its employees & related staff (Starbucks, etc), but may be good news for someone looking for a Christmas bargain?  Get on in there!

Crap.  We don't really go to Borders often, but Books Etc. is where we usually shop for books in Victoria.  Turns out I missed the news that Borders was planning on closing them before this announcement. 

We usually don't shop at Borders because the one nearest to us that I know of is a short walk from a slew of small book shops and right across the street from Foyles, so there really isn't much point to shop there (except to use the loo instead of attempting to use the one ladies room in all of Foyles).  I really hope that we are able to pick up some bargains and that this leads to some independent shops opening all over the place.  I really don't like W. H. Smith. 

I heard this the other day.  I used to buy a lot of books & educational toys for Ethan from the Borders in Inverness but not living near one now I guess I won't miss it that much. It's still a shame though.

I hate WH Smith as well. I wouldn't even call them a bookshop.  We are lucky we have a Waterstones here, they are pretty good. More and more people are going to end up shopping online though.

More and more people are going to end up shopping online though.

I think they already are, which is partly why Borders is closing down.    I'm just as guilty (shopping online at Amazon) as anyone else - the prices were better.  We used to have a little independent bookshop down the street from us, but it closed a year or two ago.

As a former Borders employee, it's not particularly surprising.  Sad, though.  I know they've only got a tenuous grip on the American market, so it's only a matter of time here as well.

I'm not surprised, but am saddened purely because the Borders here was the only place I knew of that carried some of the American literary journals that I read. 

I used to love Borders, but they stopped stocking my favourite magazine (Burda World of Fashion) about 18 months ago without any notice whatsoever so I coughed up the money for a subscription and have only gone back once or twice in that time. Still, there were few better places to kill time late at night on Charing Cross Road...