Crisis on Varia #51: The Future of Bookstores and Third Spaces
From the archive (25Apr21, 10 min read)
[This weekly is a rumination about something I feel is an opportunity, but it does not contain a fully-formed solution, just a few threads which I hope stimulates like-minded readers who care about both books and community]
I love bookstores in the European tradition. By that, I do not mean the "harsh fluorescent lights with stacks of best-sellers” chain stores once prevalent in the US, but something closer to the "historical space with not enough room so the stacks are carefully curated by highly dedicated people who have worked there because that’s their passion". In the first case, it's just another business. In the second, it's a pleasant manifestation of the love of books.
The advent of Amazon and online commerce has been a boon for a large variety of products -- the poor concierge has been sadly reduced to a destination package sorter of the absolute avalanche of packages which arrives daily to my building. But books are not ordinary products, they take active energy to absorb, perhaps the most energy of any mainstream product.
Like many art forms, there can be a great disparity of opinion around any one book than for normal products, because the value of a book needs to reach us at some deeper individual level, rather than just serving some utilitarian purpose. Similar things could be said for music or film, but the energy level required to access other art forms is generally much lower than for books, and so a disappointing recommendation costs us less in energy and effort.
There was a time when your bookshelf was like a window into your deeper preference functions, admittedly imperfect and some times curated collection, but a way for visitors to gather some specific data points about the kind of person you are -- generally the more books one had in common, the more sympatico the potential connection. Some of this persists into the Zoom age, where the older generation displays their book collections like intellectual scalps like Robert Caro's The Power Broker, to give clues about their leanings, or throw off subtle hints to like-minded enthusiasts.
This article, published back in 2017, illuminated the core of the matter -- that books aren't like other products, that the experience matters. Since the value proposition of discount bookstores was just low prices and wide selection, then it is no surprise that they quickly ceded to Amazon. But like hand-made Swiss watches, carving out a niche in the digital wasteland, the overall experience was something valued by a certain customer sub-segment.
And in the same way that certain analog businesses like precision watches are adding digital platforms to adapt to the modern age, I think there is something in potential adaptation for bookstores as well.
Let us consider what a "proper" bookstore offers:
1) A place to buy books
2) Curated recommendations (as opposed to recommendation engines)
3) A location for serendipitous exploration
4) A community of book enthusiasts
I've ranked them from low to high in terms of my subjective view of the value added. While Amazon has certainly disintermediated #1, and partly replaced #2, as we move down the list we recognize that human interaction can be a deeper part of the experience of books (as it is for music). Of all the media forms which have been digitized, books are the easiest (they are the least information dense, in terms of raw data requirements), and yet the analog form of books overwhelms digital formats (ebooks and audiobooks), even as other media have moved to nearly 100% digital consumption.
So: physical books are easy to digitize, very useful in digital format (Crisis on Varia #18: Modern Sudetenland [HK?]; e-readers vs books (Aug 23, 16 min read), the bulkiest physical format (compared to Blu-ray discs or CDs)... and yet physical books still dominate ebooks. To be fair, physical books are the only format which require no other processing device (smartphone, TV, projector etc) so it isn't an entirely fair comparison. But reading a book on your smartphone is entirely doable. So there must be something about physical books.
Coming back to my list, #3 and #4 are rare nowadays -- I suppose virtual book clubs can provide a substitute for #4, but book clubs can have issues around selection vs inclusion (it’s hard to satisfy everyone). In the few times that I've read a book with someone else, I've found it a highly enriching experience; more often, the books I've read filter into conversations, either through recommendation or discussion of some of the ideas therein. I notice that the more I read, the more I tend to ground my conversation with things I’ve learned from books, and am hopefully a better conversationalist, for all the solitary time I’ve spent reading.
As I think about the future of bookstores, I think the key might be to enhance the social aspect, perhaps like the socialization of CrossFit or Peleton which have made them stickier experiences. The world of books is an obvious way to connect people on certain topics for the purposes of conversation, but to my knowledge it hasn’t been used explicitly in this way yet.
This social aspect leads me to a slight rabbit hole: Third Spaces (or Places).
Third Spaces
I'll use the term Third Spaces because 'Third Places' seems like a depressed group of bronze medalists, rather than the idea of a space which is neither home nor work, somewhere you visit to socialize, but where there is no obligation to visit, no set schedule, and even no certainty about who you might meet there. In preparation for this part, I read Ray Oldenberg's The Great Good Place, perhaps not the greatest title, but a deeply satisfying work.
Derived from common elements of a Viennese coffeehouse, a German beer garden, a French cafe, or a British pub, Oldenberg's idealized form of a Third Space is somewhere (like the Cheers TV show) where everyone knows your name, is nearby (often walking distance -- a 'local' to a Brit); it is convivial, populated with regulars but welcoming to newcomers, without hierarchy, and generally without agenda. It is a place where wit is admired, conversations aren't confined to groups but can flow organically, and topics of discussion often devolve into good-natured teasing of various regulars. One goes to third spaces because they are fun, they are an escape from the pressures of home and work, and because relaxing in the company of chums is usually better than staring out at the ocean by yourself, no matter how beautiful the view.
Oldenberg focuses his efforts on the idealized concept of Third Space, but there are many other institutions which approximate these functions, although they tend to be self-selecting or, at worst, exclusionary (in contrast with his inclusionary ideal). Churches, fraternal orders (Freemasons, Odd Fellows, Elk, Moose), service organizations (Rotary, Kiwanis), social and activity-based (gyms) clubs of all sorts -- generally require membership / dues, and have entrance criteria. They tend to be less diverse, farther from home, and have more responsibilities than Oldenberg's corner cafe / pub / beer garden.
Oldenberg has much to say about the sociological benefits of Third Spaces which I won't try to summarize (because I think they are somewhat obvious), but will merely add this quote as a glimpse of his argument:
"People enjoy the third place interlude and are left feeling better about themselves afterward for having received and bestowed the warm acceptance that is its hallmark."
Oldenberg takes the United States, or more precisely the suburbanization of the American household, to task for largely asphyxiating Third Spaces due to zoning restrictions and the large distances that need to be traversed, as well as the weaker tradition of Third Spaces compared to Europe.
I don't think I've ever felt a part of an idealized Third Space, in any of the metropolitan areas in which I've lived (but never in the suburbs!); I do appreciate the familiarity of Soho House's outposts around the world, and in Barcelona I was a Norm-like fixture at the Soho House bar for a few weeks, as I was at the Wingtip club in San Francisco, but my interaction was largely with the staff, rather than other members. I've never really gotten to know my neighbors and area residents (other than the annoying ones who make too much noise).
Come to think of it, I've had more of those interactions in Japan than any other country I've lived in. I've found the cozy intimacy of sushi places often leads to informal conversation around the counter, even if they are more one-off conversations rather than among regulars. In tiny Japanese restaurants where introductions are necessary (kind of an ad-hoc filtering mechanism), spontaneous conversations have been more frequent, possibly because the introduction mechanism has created a kind of safe space..
Overall, my socializations are almost entirely pre-planned rather than serendipitous, which, given my normal travel schedule, is to be expected. And yet I definitely get what Oldenberg is propounding, and am open to changing my activities in favor of more Third Space interactions, if I could find any. In Honolulu, there’s a restaurant I’ve invested in -- even on days when I don’t have reservations, sometimes I’ll poke my head in to see what’s going on, to chat with the staff and see what wonders Mimi the amazing patissier has on the menu.
If we think about our time distribution around the home/work/third spaces, COVID has disproportionately forced us into the home bucket, even as we Zoom around for work. As restrictions lift (but some risks remain), a full return to previous patterns of commuting to work like before is not likely, leaving more time at home, and, I would argue, even more need for time in Third Spaces (if only to regain our individual sanity).
Back to bookstores
Coming back to our main theme then, it seems to me that the modern bookstore is one or two modifications away from becoming a Third Space around the activity of reading. And since reading has infinite subcategories, but is also a sign of depth, a combination which cries out for social interaction. This suggests that the full range of social possibilities are yet unplumbed. The implicit requirement that all participants love to read is an acceptable standard to me -- it demonstrates a level of commitment and energy which probably creates better interactions than with people who can't be bothered or don't have the energy to read.
Oldenberg contends (and I heartily agree) that drinks (both alcoholic and non-) appear necessary to lubricate conversation (without getting carried away), while some level of food is useful for allowing fertile conversations to continue without needing to go somewhere else. In my ideal incarnation, a cozy bookstore would be augmented with a hushed reading room, sound-insulated from a bar/restaurant space where more lively conversations and periodic events could percolate. The goal would be a literary Third Space, somewhere you’d go when you had free time, when you were looking for a book, or when you wanted to share your experience with a book. A place where conversational banter and wit were valued, but where you could encounter a diverse group of people, linked only by their love of reading.
The additional expense of those modifications and necessary floor space would not be viable with a business model of simply selling books; likely some kind of membership income would be necessary, but the clientele would have to buy into that as a different business model. Given the importance of the wider social function, I could also imagine a charity element, where generous patrons could underwrite facilities or operating expenses for the general welfare (and to underline the worth of the concept).
At some level, when I go to Heywood Hill, my favorite bookstore in London, poke around and resist the temptation to buy more books than I could possibly carry, pop around the corner to Little House Mayfair, happily wrapping myself in the first leaves of one of the books I've just bought, I am bringing together two business models in partial fulfillment of this ideal. But I am still missing the entire social dimension, which might involve regularly striking up rabbit hole conversations about the books I or someone else was reading.