Waterstones has been heavily criticized for the wages paid, in the UK, with demands for living wages. B&N was good about that, for many years; but, just last year let go all of their full-time booksellers, forcing them to reapply as part-time. Only management is full-time, with only store manager and above (district and regional) as salaried.

I'm glad I got out when I did, though not about the circumstances that led to it. I can guarantee you what will happen next. They will cut payroll even further, offload other assets, and squeeze every dime out of it, to recoup their investment; then, unload it when they need to balance their portfolio of holdings.

On the surface, it is better for Waterstones, as B&N has a pretty extensive distribution network and more stores. That gives them more product for the UK and a conduit for stuff to America. however, copyright laws are different, which might present issues for some things, not to mention geographic publication rights. For instance, I do not believe that B&N could sell the UK editions of Harry Potter in the US, since Scholastic has US rights (which is a drawback of the audio editions, with Stephen Fry, vs the American, with Jim Dale). B&N has a line of classics; but, some of those are not in the public domain in the UK and vice versa. ironically, a lot of B&N's bargain editions are UK publications, especially history books.

Long term, I don't think this will save either company. Amazon controls 50% of the bookselling market, without the liability of maintaining an extensive store network (despite their newer brick and mortar stores). It has been killing bookselling in the US and the UK. Both companies have reacted by diversifying their merchandise to include non-book material; but; it hasn't made up for loss of revenue with B&N. Waterstone's was in bad shape before the current CEO took over and revamped things. However, I suspect you will see less and less of the personal touch and more and more corporate BS, with further branching into other junk. B&N will continue to close under-performing stores and those in over-saturated markets or with high retail rents. Don't expect new openings in smaller markets, as there is less incentive for that now than in the 90s, when B&N was robust and expanding.

It used to be a great company to work for; but, that was long ago. It may have been a chain; but, it functioned, internally, like an indie bookstore. The staff were passionate book readers and sellers and knew their stuff. Then, the same thing that happened to other industries happened to it: corporatization and homogenization. When I started with B&N, in 1993, we had near total say on our displays. Certain tables were for certain categories of titles (new release octagon, at the front of the store, new release kids' octagon, etc...); but, we determined the titles we put on the display, while following the visual display guidelines (use the surface area, without big gaps, have stacks pyramided, from tall to short, mix colors where possible, etc...). The exception was the NYT Bestseller display, which was determined by position on the list. Ober time, more and more real estate had specific themes or title lists and placement was actually purchased by publishers. That got worse, as it went from specific title lists to specific positioning on the display. We went from minimal use of floor "dumps" (cardboard displays) to masses of them. B&N didn't initially have a rewards program and offered 10% off all hardcovers and additional discounts on current bestsellers. The VP in charge of the stores fought the program when it was being considered and resigned soon after it was introduced, with the claims that we, as booksellers, would not have quotas, which was a major reason for booksellers leaving the B Dalton stores (which B&N owned). That lasted about 6 months, then became part of our reviews.

B&N went into e-commerce early; but, had a lot of technical issues at the start, and lost ground to Amazon. When Amazon went public, it was inundated with capital and we couldn't compete at that level, though we didn't carry much debt and had untouched lines of credits, up through the Nook launch. Then, B&N had the problem of different pricing between BN.com and the stores, due to having to pay for overhead somehow. At first, we had no incentive to steer people to the website, as it took business away from us. Then, they made it so we could order things for customers, for direct delivery to the home, at online pricing, and get sales credit for it. That ws all fine and good; but, eventually, people were so conditioned to think of online ordering as Amazon that, if we didn't have it on the shelf, they would go home and order from Amazon, even if we could order it right there, at the same price.

We were never able to compete on movie or music pricing; but, we could with selection, carrying more titles for connoisseurs, rather than just the new releases and hit titles. You might find the latest Tom hanks movie at Walmart or Target; but, you weren't going to find the newest Criterion Edition, or programming seen on Masterpiece Theater or other british programming seen on PBS (let alone top foreign films). Here again, online pricing won out.

Selling Starbucks Coffee in our cafes (which, despite what people think, are B&N Cafes, owned and operated by the company, which just sell Starbucks brand coffee)was another draw; but, Starbucks used their sales data, from our supply ordering, to test markets and then opened their own stores within blocks of B&N (and next door, in some areas). They are just as cut-throat as every other corporation, no matter how they try to spin it with hipsters. Food and beverage runs on pretty tight margins, under the best of circumstances; so, with competition, they aren't big money makers.

Nook was a tough decision. B&N needed to have an outlet for the digital market; but, development costs were outside our capitalization and the constant changes in technology and need to have "the latest thing" that drives the electronics market proved overwhelming. B&N still avoided deficit financing of it; but, could never compete with Amazon or Microsoft, on that front. They should have partnered from the start, as they have since, with Samsung. They did much better with content, though Amazon has gotten pretty draconian on that front and they have the economic muscle to intimidate publishers. A few have called their bluffs (and Amazon caved every time); but, with outlets shrinking, publishers don't have as much power as they once did. the idea that booksellers could suddenly become electronics salespeople was not well thought out and it was a rough transition. We didn't even have demonstrator models in most stores, for about a month or so, from the launch date. They went to the biggest markets first. The rest of us were stuck with a brochure that was the same size as the device, and some rather minimal (and vague) training. Infact, on the day of the release, I got called up to talk to a customer about the new device and ended up trying to use the brochure to explain to richard Dreyfuss how the device (which we didn't have) would work and how it compared to his Kindle, which I had never seen and only had vague specs for our device. I have no idea if he ever bought one; but, I did my best and didn't play fanboy over his movie roles, though I did have in the back of my head I should tell him I loved Hello Down There, just to see his reaction. Had it not been a professional situation, I would have. Still had no idea why he was in Champaign, IL, on that date, as there was nothing in the media about him coming to the U of I for any reason.

When I resigned, in 2014, it had been publicly announced that CEO and chief shareholder Len Riggio was selling 1/3 of his stock, for "estate planning" purposes. in other words, he was cashing out stock, looking to retire. I knew then and there he was looking to sell. Prior to that, he fought off a takeover bid and at least two proxy battles, with shareholders. If he was looking to punch out, I knew the company's days were numbered. Everyone else just wanted to piecemeal things for a fast buck. i suspect that will happen here, within 5 years of the sale.

The real heart of the company seemed to have disappeared wehn Steve riggio, the president and brother of len, resigned. he had been a big leader in the tech improvements and in the culture of the company. However, he had a special needs child and was pulled away more and more, over health issues. That child passed away and he walked away from the company. From that point on, it became a nastier and nastier place to work. It wasn't perfect before; but, it was worse after. Still, it was 20 years of my life and where I made some of my closest friendships (two of whom have passed away, from cancer), met the woman who took my virginity (I could have been a consultant on the 40 Year-Old Virgin, if they had dropped the age to 30), and where I met up with my wife, on our first blind date. I had an entire store full of co-workers go to bat for me after I had been passed over for managerial positions by a store manager who felt threatened by my abilities and leadership skills (such as they may be) and sent a letter of support to my DM, when I applied for a managerial position, under a new store manager. I got the job, too, and the DM shared the letter with me, after making the offer. I had a closer bond to those people than anyone I served with, in the military.