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Harvard Book Store cancels plans for Prudential expansion
By adamg on Fri, 02/02/2024 - 4:11pm
The Harvard Book Store announced today it just couldn't make the numbers work and has called off plans to open a second shop across the river at the Prudential Center:
The cancellation of the Pru project is humbling and disappointing. Despite exploring all available options, the lingering effects of the pandemic have continued to create considerable challenges for construction projects of this size and scope. With ongoing disruptions to the supply chain and escalating costs, our ambitious 29,000-square-foot expansion would ultimately prove unsustainable.
The bookstore, in which John and Linda Henry have invested, said it will instead concentrate on "improvements at our flagship Cambridge location." No specifics, but:
Our goal is to enhance the in-store experience, while continuing to enrich our commitment to customer service, our flourishing author event series, and our excellent inventory.
We want to accomplish all this while minimizing disruption to the customer experiences you’ve come to love.
Neighborhoods:
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Comments
He’s a Billionaire
He can afford a few hobbies that don’t make money and aren’t just his yachts.
Tax all these worthless boils on society out existence.
They were in the Back Bay once before
with a bookstore cafe on Newbury Street, where Stephanie's restaurant is today. From the store's history page:
That explains it
I was wondering about that. The sign in the Pru said it was coming in winter 2023 but it didn't seem like they were making any progress on it.
I wonder why they needed such
I wonder why they needed such an expensive renovation of the space — since the previous tenant was also a bookstore.
Barnes and Noble
I seem to recall the Barnes and Noble left because the landlord wanted a local bookstore in the location. So no bookstore now.
They've closed a lot of locations
I'm fairly certain those landlords didn't care about replacing them with another bookstore.
Is there a single local business still in the Pru?
Aside from the kiosks which include LovePop?
It’s chains all the way down, just the way out-of-state property managers like it.
The Luxe Generica Collection
Shoppes that wealthy students, tourists, and business travelers find comforting.
My son's partner works in that mall - It's like an upscale airport mall. I've never seen so many casually overdressed folks in my life.
Anna's Taqueria
Anna's Taqueria
Hardly out of state
The Pru is also headquarters of BXP which owns it. They could not BE more local.
I do wish there was more
I do wish there was more specifics. From their words, they did everything they can but the numbers won't work. But given the space was already a book store, I have hard time fathoming why can't they use the space as-is (assuming it wasn't too torn down).
It would look like Barnes & Noble, but that should be low cost and would hurt impressions that badly? I wonder what's the economics of it that make it unprofitable (barring the industry as a whole is just not viable anymore - which I hope that's not the reason).
Sorry it won't be happening...
...but I think it's pretty lame to blame "supply chain issues."
Yeah maybe they realized
The Pru mall is sort of an odd place for a bookstore. Foot traffic there is never that high, and it doesn't quite seem to be the kind of people who are going to buy a lot of books. Trident over on Newbury sells books, is that not enough?
So there's room for only 1
So there's room for only 1 bookstore in that general vicinty?
Really?
I take it you never waited in one of the long lines in the old Barnes & Noble in the Pru?
You don't remember when every mall had at least one bookstore?
A lot of them were cookie-cutter Waldenbooks or B. Dalton, but some were more local like Lauriat's and Paperback Booksmith. Copley Place had two bookstores at one point, the other being Rizzoli. None of this was that long ago.
CambridgeSide Galleria had a busy Borders before that chain went under.
Lafayette
There was even a Paperback Booksmith in the doomed-from-the-start Lafayette Place at DTX in the 1980s. It was one of the few reasons to go there unless you liked the 80s ultra-mod men's clothes at Chess King or the food at Taco Bell in the food court. And to both I say "bleah!".
The Pru
If they had a deal in place and the space sat empty for a year, didn't The Pru lose out on potential revenue? I wonder if they have to pay any compensation.
What's pitiful...
..is that it took 18 months to come to this decision. Just what supply chain issue have they been wrestling with all that time?
As for the location, B&N did well for years. Sure you sell books of all sorts plus cards and calendars and stuffed animals, but the Pru has thousands of travelers looking for airplane reading and Boston-themed stuff for all ages. And there were certain times when the bookstore was packed with people waiting for a table at the Cheesecake Factory.
It would have to become something different from the Harvard BS in Cambridge. Would have been fun watching the Harvard BS crew get their heads around that side of the business.
Agreed
It's also hard to believe that there are still supply chain issues. Nobody else seems to be having that problem.
Step up, Northeastern!
You're already taking over a tower at the adjacent Sheraton. Here's your chance to expand your campus bookstore, increase your visibility, even team up with other nearby schools that could use a bookstore boost, like Berklee, BU, etc. It's a shame to let this space go to waste any longer.
Have you SEEN college bookstores?
These days, Barnes & Noble runs the college bookstores and it wrecks them. They took over one of the oldest bookstores in the country, in my Pennsylvania hometown, which had been beloved for generations. Now it's like a little warehouse, lit by fluorescent tubes, empty of shoppers, but packed with college logo gear. People tend to cry or throw fits when they discover what happened to it. Check out the Harvard Coop if you already haven't — formerly the best bookstore in Cambridge, which was saying something. Now you can buy yourself a couple of T-shirts and browse a small collection of books on the mezzanine. We steel ourselves to go in there, it's so depressing.
Yeah, what's happened to the other wing of the Coop?
The one where all the textbooks and college souvenirs used to be. It's been "under renovation" for years.
But at least the main building still has a "reasonable" amount of books.
If you want to see real B&N college bookstore wreckage, go to the new BU bookstore. The old one had four floors. The new one has almost _nothing_ in it.
Once a frequent visitor to BU and Coop
I was a frequent visitor to both the BU Bookstore and the Harvard Coop until they switched everything around. I also remember as far back as the mid-late 80s of the Coop having an extensive music collection and real clothing.
The last time I went to the Coop was about a year ago. They still have the books, but the layout is more for tourists and parents of students than anything else now.
The Coop needed a new vision.
The Coop needed a new vision. But they got it 100% wrong.
Until the 1990s, they were stuck as an early-1900s department store, with large rooms full of men's suits and luggage.
Then they turned the main building into a cookie-cutter Barnes and Noble, with a bad selection of housewares in the back building. Then a few years ago, they decided to stop stocking textbooks, turning themselves into a mail-order service. Which is a great way to drive their remaining textbook business to Amazon.
Selling Harvard sweatshirts to the tourists is a necessary evil, but the rest of the store could be so much better.
In defense of today's Coop...
It is definitely not the Coop of old, but I will say the bookstore staff is good. Some are refugees from the Schoenhofs purge, but they are quite helpful and knowledgeable. There's still a decent selection there. Most Barnes & Noble shops have turned into self-help and general garbage (a la airport book kiosks), so it's nice that some are still around that have more variety.
Bookstores have been in freefall since Amazon metastasized all over the market, but more recently independent bookstores have had a bit of a revival. I can't believe that some sort of "place-making" bookstore concept in the Pru couldn't work out, but then again, it's not MY money...
Fair take on the Coop
Perhaps I was seeing the Coop through old lenses; I remember there being a lot more books then than there is now.
BU book- snore
The new BU bookstore and its downsizing was due to moving from buildings BU sole. In addition these things are planned with the university so it was BUs choice to scale down - the loss of a cafe and general trade books makes it more of a “textbook shop” than anything else.
It’s a shame all the bookstores except Trident where I took my kids are all gone. Amazon kinda killed Quantum books and Wordsworth. However the textbook publishers aren’t fans of Amazon which is why Amazon hasn’t been able to kill college bookstores how it tried to kill textbook rental (which it stopped last year)
Maybe stop hanging around college bookstores and get some friends your own age.
Harvard Coop
I'm old and I remember when the Harvard Coop had everything cool under the sun. Not only a vast selection of books, but it had one of the best and hippest record departments in all of Boston and Cambridge. Also prints. Even men's suits and all kinds of clothing for everyone. Now it's so drab that even tourists find it boring.
Not the same BN
College bookstore are run by Barnes and Noble college - a spin off that has been around for decades and is not pet of BN / BN.com
BNC and Follet are two main physical bookstore managers in the US now but many schools want ala cart services - the COOP is a mess because BNC supplies the books and systems but Harvard actually staffs and runs it. Harvard has a mess of an internal IT division - each school within it operates as its own IT org and their systems are still many years behind current ones.
Try knowing what you are talking about before you open your yap
Back in the day there was an new kind of bookseller
If you go back to the beginning of this century a new kind of bookseller began to grow
It was named after a large river if I recall
Today its really hard to compete as a brick and mortar bookseller
Amazon or Nile can outcompete for the product from the publisher -- due to its huge customer base -- and has all the distribution to deliver the product to the customers with less hassle -- just look at the on--line material -- decide if you like the book and click add to cart
Even most specialty booksellers such as the Kendall Sq's once very successful Quantum Books have pulled the plug -- and gone virtual -- about all that are left as physical bookstores are captives like the Coop or the MIT Press