Barnes & Noble

I quit my job yesterday.  I gave them a notice so I still have three shifts left before it’s officially over, but for all intents and purposes, by next Saturday, I will be just a full-time student doing what I can to get out of there at a better pace than I currently am.  It was not an easy decision.  It’s something I’ve been meditating on for two months and given some prayer and conversation with others about.  Once in a while, you have to take the plunge.

I am excited.  On top of being able to devote all my energies on my school, it also opens more time for other things that kept getting pushed to the side.  I actually have time to go to the Sacramento temple twice a month (something I have sorely missed.)  It also gives me time to volunteer at my local library—considering how much I have used that service over the years, I feel it’s only right to be giving back to the community, even if it’s just a small part.

I have things to be excited about, and I am, but… it is tough to say good-bye.  I can’t say enough how wonderful the Barnes & Noble bookstore has been this past year.  It has been my favorite store since my college days; I used to hang out there in between college classes and some semesters, I spent more hours there than I had in Institute.

Barnes & Noble was my dream job.  Not a dream profession; I didn’t then and still don’t have any desire to be in a retail career.  But I loved that store, I love books, and the employees I saw always looked happy to be where they were at.  There are not many jobs out there with that sort of benefit.

I cannot believe my good fortune still that I was hired so quickly after moving to Sacramento.  The hours were terrible and the pay even worse—which is about par for my working life.  But the experience has been without price.  I have never had such a string of good managers and friendly co-workers, and let me tell you, that alone put this as one of the best jobs I’ve ever had.

Some Things I’ve Learned

1)      I am good at customer service.  Not something I ever expected, but considering my patience and organization skills (contrary to the current state of my bedroom, I can be tidy) the service desk was a great fit for me.  And that was great because I despise being at the cash registers.

2)      The Nook is a really cool device.  Check it out sometime; they have demos and classes for Nook at the store, all free of charge.  It beats the heck out of the Kindle, tell you what.

3)      I will never get over the Love & Sex bay sitting right next to the Teen section.  I mean, what are they saying?

4)      You need gloves to work with magazines.  Every time I was given the duty of shelving magazines, I always finished my shift with three paper cuts.  I swear you could kill someone with a copy of Elle.

5)      Much as I hated working at the registers, I’m not a terrible salesman, but I have too much respect for the customer’s wallet to ever be great at it—this was a real pain in selling the membership discounts.

But the constant wake-up call for me is how the times have changed.  I’ve always loved published books.  I’ve changed my opinions over the years about the styles; I used to prefer paperbacks because I could carry them everywhere, but nowadays, I’m willing to splurge a bit for a hardcover, because you not only get a good story, but they look so much better on a bookshelf.  But the paper publishing industry is suffering. 

Borders went out of business because of this.  Barnes & Noble would have if they didn’t jump on the eReader bandwagon, which is one-third of their business, last I checked.  They’re not competing with other bookstores anymore as there aren’t any left.  You can still find used bookstores but they’re not doing so hot.  Publishers are aggressively pushing books on electronic format because that’s what’s selling.  Barnes & Noble is competing with Apple, Amazon, and Google, and they’ll be the first to admit that they’re the underdog in this race. 

Here’s the kicker: I overheard my co-worker speaking with a customer about this very subject and he told, “It wouldn’t take much for publishers to take real books seriously again.  If only a few more people would buy the real books instead of the devices, publishers would back down a bit and go back to pushing the regular format.”  Which makes total sense to me.  Much like the movies, you vote with your dollar. 

If you’re among the folks that want to keep their paper books lasting for a while longer, let me make a final recommendation.  Barnes & Noble has a leather-bound series that look gorgeous, gold on the edge and ribbon bookmark attached, for classics.  I have Shakespeare’s complete works, Edgar Allen Poe’s poems and stories, the complete Sherlock Holmes, and a collection of American poetry from this collection.  They do not stop there.  The classics are numerous, from Charles Dickens to Jane Austen, Gray’s Anatomy to Jules Verne.  They’ve gone modern as well.  You can get works from Anne Rice, Neal Gaiman, Ernest Hemingway, Stephen King, Harper Lee, H. P. Lovecraft, and there’s even a leather-bound for the original Star Wars trilogy. 

Most recently, they’ve come out with the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence in one volume and Dune by Frank Herbert.  All of these are only $20 each for multiple stories, if not complete works, and they look beautiful on your shelves. 

They’ve started doing a children’s series as well.  They colors are much brighter but they still look great, and they have some of the greats: Little Women, Peter Pan, The Swiss Family Robinson, The Secret Garden, and several others.  Bound to be more if people keep purchasing them, and these are only $10.

I’m not getting paid extra to write this (that'd be awesome if I were.)  I just love books, it is still my favorite store, and I want it to go on for a long, long time producing the same wonderful products I’ve enjoyed.