Editorial: Tech lag to blame for Borders’ demise

If there’s any correlation between books and failure, it’s usually that we fail to read… If there’s any correlation between books and failure, it’s usually that we fail to read them.

But as of yesterday, it seems that failure has also descended onto a major book retailer itself: Borders. Forty years and millions of pages since its launch in Ann Arbor, Mich., the chain filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Wednesday. According to the company’s bankruptcy filing, it accumulated $1.29 billion in debt with only $1.27 billion underlying assets.

Among the 30 percent of the 650 stores Borders plans closing – the so-called “underperforming” stores – are three Pittsburgh locations, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported yesterday. The Monroeville Mall, Bethel Park and East Liberty stores will get the ax.

After anticipating the bankruptcy for months, analysts blame the fall of Borders on strategic misdirection, overexpansion and a general lagging behind book retailers like Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble in online book sales, according to The New York Times.

Though we send our condolences to the affected Borders employees in the area, most bibliophiles of Pittsburgh needn’t worry. The book writing and book publishing industry is far from lost.

In fact, with Borders gone, the book market might benefit overall.

Analysts told the Times that Borders’ substantial debt with landlords and publishers that might go largely unpaid, making it easier for other stores like Barnes & Noble to leverage their position with landlords and publishers. Cheaper rent and cheaper manufacturing prices could mean less pocket pain for customers.

But more importantly, taking Borders from the scene seems to make Darwinian sense. Surely, Borders.com lists “The Origin of Species” for $6.95, but before May 2010, customers couldn’t read it on a Borders-backed e-reader. The Borders Kobo came long after the Amazon Kindle and Barnes & Noble Nook, but it wasn’t even launched with a wireless option and before this story, we hadn’t even heard of the Kobo. The New York Times also reports that Borders didn’t have a viable Internet commerce site of its own until 2008.

The point here is that with about $13 billion in book sales per year, the market for books is as vibrant as ever, and a company that didn’t capitalize on the waxing trends of book digitalization and online ordering seems to have personally bought a ticket to the United States Bankruptcy Court.

As much as us paper-lovers hate to admit, e-reading is connecting consumers — or those lucky few who choose to consume books — to the full range of literary niches in a way never before known. Book providers should understand this. Borders didn’t.