JESSICA SMITH Borders Books & Music closed Saturday after 15 years of operation at the Mid-State Mall on Route 18 in East Brunswick. EAST BRUNSWICK – Many in the township paid their last respects to an old friend last week.
Borders Books and Music, at the Mid State Mall on Route 18, closed its doors Saturday after 15 years of providing everything from classic books to celluloid blockbusters, cool beats and coffee beans.
“It’s horrible that they’re leaving,” said Mimi LaRaque, of Sayreville. “I love this store. My whole family, we all come here at least once a week. It’s really too bad that this happened.”
LaRaque was headed into the store for a last hurrah, to take advantage of discounts of at least 40 percent off the entire stock last week. Inside, she chatted with staff and other customers about the closing.
Some customers at the store on Jan. 8 were unaware of its closing until they arrived and saw the small sign posted just inside its doors, which thanked them for their patronage.
Irina and Oleg Kouznetsova, of East Brunswick, said they shopped there because of its convenient location, but would now go to the Barnes & Noble store in the Brunswick Square Mall.
“From the business community standpoint, we’re very disappointed that a store of that caliber finds the need to close its doors in East Brunswick,” said Marianne Wehrenberg, executive director of the East Brunswick Regional Chamber of Commerce.
The store first opened its doors in East Brunswick in October 1992. According to Kolleen O’Meara, public relations specialist for Borders at its corporate headquarters in Ann Arbor, Mich., store locations undergo periodic reviews by the headquarters in order to determine whether they are producing enough revenue. Factors such as changing demographics and other patterns in the community contribute to the productivity of a given location, she said.
“This store has been identified as an underperforming location,” O’Meara said.
But what the customers lacked in number, they seemed to make up for in loyalty. East Brunswick resident Charles Newman said he frequented the store for 10 years because he felt it was better than any others in the area.
“It’s just a shame,” Newman said. “It’s been an icon here. To me, it’s a total crime. I love this store.”
Regular customer Paul Aran had his own theories about what may have brought on the store’s demise. He said the store had better prices than its competitors, but he often found that titles he was looking for were not in stock.
“We shop here often, but a lot of people just come and browse like it’s a public library,” Aran said.
According to Aran, some customers go to the store to sample books by reading them there, then purchase them through another outlet, like Amazon.com.
Both Borders and Barnes & Noble offer customers the ability to make themselves at home in their stores, whether by finding a comfortable chair among the shelves in which to peruse a book or magazine, or by bringing a title into the store’s café to enjoy it with a cup of joe.
As customers scrambled for lastminute bargains from somewhat de- pleted shelves last week, there seemed to be a sense of camaraderie among them. Strangers chatted about their shared loss, and discussed their difficulty in keeping from going overboard with purchases due to the discounts, arms precariously balancing piles of merchandise.
The Borders closing comes in the wake of the Mid State Lanes bowling alley closing last April in the shopping center. A New York Sports Club fitness center is slated for the former bowling alley area.
Wehrenberg said she is not aware of any new tenant slated for the Borders location.