Borders allegedly planning to trash thousands of books when Waldenbooks close

[John Dishon]

http://www.inhabitat.com/2010/01/18/borders-plans-to-trash-tens-of-...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/erik-ose/why-wont-borders-donate-t_b_...

What do you think? Should Borders trash the books or donate them? Think of how many libraries of schools could benefit from donated books.

[John McFetridge]

The Huffington Post article looks like it could have been on The Onion.

[Jack Getze]

No journalism here. Is it really true? Hard to believe they'd trash that many. I've been told every book in the store is returnable.

[John Dishon]

I added allegedly to the discussion title. The Huffington Post ought to have done that as well.

Still, the concern is newsworthy.

[Dana King]

I'd think Borders could find some way to actually get something back for the books. Sell them to a salvage company by the pound, maybe. (I used to work for such an operation.) School libraries might not have need of a lot of the books they'll need to dispose of, but thrift stores and other charity-related operations might.

It occurred to me as I wrote this that there may be a tax or accounting procedure that makes it more economically friendly to Borders to destroy the books. If that's the case, good luck talking them out of it.

[John McFetridge]

"... the company plans to dispose of many unsold books in the cheapest, easiest, least responsible way possible..."

I would expect nothing less from a corporate decision.

[John Dishon]

I first saw this story on Reddit and I think one of the commenters makes a good point:

I'm a keyholder at one of the closing Waldenbooks and the people running Borders know that the company is doomed and are trying everything to get people back into the stores with no success. They have ignored the fact that a little good will will go a long way in bringing people to Borders and donations are a great way to do that. We have had to turn down many offers from book fairs and libraries. Had we given them books they possibly could have turned into a customer in the future. Instead they leave with bad feelings all while Borders plans to send you more emails as part of their failed rewards program and just blame the booksellers like me when nothing works.

[I. J. Parker]

Donate them to the troops in Afghanistan or send them to Haiti's libraries. That way they'll not cost authors any sales.

[Suzanne]

Good idea. It would also give them the same tax deduction that destruction would.

[John McFetridge]

Donations would be good. Keep in mind they speak French in Haiti so a lot of English books wouldn't be of great value, but there are plenty of places a donation could be made.

[I. J. Parker]

I know they speak French (Creole, really), and notwithstanding French criticism of American take-charge attitude in the rescue efforts, it is really in the U.S. most Haitians have placed their hopes. Learning English is surely of the greatest importance there.

[EDWARD C MORGAN]

Having spent 18 months in Haiti in the early 90s, I can attest to Ingrid's statement that Haitians have placed hopes in the U.S. as it has always been the case. I've never met folks who wanted to more imitate our nation than them.

[Kris Neri]

Depending on where they bought them (publishers/wholesalers), they could probably return most of them, and only take a small loss on all of them. But it sounds as if they expect to liquidate most of their stock and not have much left at the end.