Zeeba Ville

So I hear Chapters online is doing terrific business.
How can a small business like Zeeba Books compete with these huge companies? I love hearing that their business is doing well 'cause guess what? Some of those books they're selling are mine. Although thay don't specify the dealers, they act as intermediary for used book dealers like Zeeba books. We sell a few at Chapters, a few at Barnes and Noble, a few at Amazon.ca etc... Nothing beats seeing someone from down the street find a great book at our place but adding a pile of Internet sales sure helps to pay the bills.

Had a very enjoyable day at the shop today. My old friend Dean dropped by, always nice. We are taking off on a 4 day golf trip in a few weeks so we had a little planning session that went something like this. 'Ron is thinking of walking some of the courses I want to drive.' I agreed wholeheartedly(the course are a little hilly!). My Dad popped in the shop, my friends Mina and Diane popped in. Oh...and we sold a few books to. We had an older gentleman pop in for the first time and he practically scolded me because he had walked by here a few times and never knew we sold books here - That I should have done more to inform him. Hummm, the sign out front is a picture of a boy holding a book, there are books displayed in the window and the 1 foot high lettering says ' Zeeba Livres (french for books)...I always get a kick out of visitors telling me I'm not spending enough on advertising, that word of mouth isn't really enough. They tell me this while standing inside my shop :)

Here's a little article from the New York Times with its take on some great fiction.

I just can't seem to get my head around the idea of constant growth, in particular to the corporate craving of growth. I understand the need to satisfy investors but there has to be a limit. Won't any population become ill if it grows too large? Abe Books just purchased Library Thing. Library Thing is a pretty cool website and Abe used to be a pretty cool collection of used book dealers. Abe has chosen to go the evil empire way, looking more and more like a money hungry, investor feeding machine with little regard for the booksellers that were once the core of its business. We still sell some books on Abe and will continue to do so until it is no longer worth the effort.
Perhaps I should be thanking Abe. They constantly remind me why I chose to be a nice little family shop and leave the corporate world behind.

Is it worth having a blog if you have nothing to say?
Either I have writer's block or perhaps the dumbness first perceived in high school is finally reaching critical mass.

I'm taking off for a well deserved mini-vacation at the end of this month. Playing Golf for 4 days with some old friends. Why is it that whenever I mention to Ron that I probably won't drink too much as I want to play some good golf (very difficult with a hangover) he just chuckles??