I’m The Dumb Guy At The Smart Bookstore

Oh no! I knew times were tough in print magazines, but this is horrible.

Helaine and I were in Downtown New Haven this bitterly cold afternoon. First a little clothes shopping, then we headed to Broadway. Helaine had an errand to run for Stef and suggested I go to the Yale Bookstore. No objection there.

I enjoy bookstores a lot though this one always leaves me feeling a little inadequate! It’s a bookstore specifically set up to serve the brightest from Yale with esoteric titles you won’t find elsewhere.

Shhh. Don’t tell. Behind the learned collection it’s really a Barnes and Noble.

I headed to the back first and Starbucks. A little coffee, a little shmoozing (Michael Bolton’s sister stopped me to say hello) and then to the magazines.

Oh no! I knew times were tough in print magazines, but this is horrible.

The Yale Bookstore used to have hundreds of magazines. No more. The magazine rack has been pared like a half dead shrub you’re trying to save. Most of the interesting little titles are gone.

There are winners and losers in the digital era. Unfortunately when so many of these narrowly focused publications disappear we all lose right along with the publishers and staff.

10 thoughts on “I’m The Dumb Guy At The Smart Bookstore”

  1. i never did care for that Barnes and Noble never did have much of a selection of magazines plus they always seemed to be behind with newer additions

  2. News Haven over on Chapel tween High & College is by far a better periodical shop than B&N disguised as Yales book store. Your right about their focus. They care mostly about over priced text books & anything written by Yale faculty. They fill that need but aren’t what the old Coop was. I miss the Yale Co-op.

  3. I miss the serendipity of browsing magazines and books I didn’t know existed.
    Too bad bookstores are going the way of record stores (Borders=Tower Records.)
    I suppose the web will have to be the storehouse of niche subject knowledge.
    Need to learn about, say, model airplanes? The answer is (hopefully) a mouse click away.

  4. Happened to go by the Borders bookstore that is closing in the Milford mall… incredibly crowded for relatively small percentages off the full price of items. Lamented with another shopper about the demise of the book due to electronic devices and the Internet…

  5. I really don’t buy magazines anymore I used to when we had
    to for Girl Scouts and the kids school for fundraisers, you can
    get a whole year or two years for the price of three-four magazines you would buy at the bookstore. I know the just
    opened a new Borders 3 years ago in Southbury and now they
    are closing it. My daughter does love to read ( not as much
    since she got the laptop) but hey I use my library in Woodbury.
    Geoff still miss you on tv.

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