电子书时代 书店出路在何方

Having a simple meal, picking up a good book and enjoying a cup of coffee - These are what you can do at the Trends Lounge bookstore in Beijing's CBD.

Most books there are original editions, and you can find them under dozens of categories.

Xu Zhiqiang, general manager of Trends Lounge, talks about how the store differs from other bookstores.

"We are different from other bookstores because we have lots of original edition books as well as imported magazines."

Xu says more than 70 percent of the books in the store come from abroad, and mainly focus on the arts, design, film and culture. There are also some books that are difficult to find in other bookstores or online bookshops.

Xu says he insists on selecting titles that are fashionable and thought provoking. That's why the majority of his frequent customers are those from the art, fashion and culture industries.

"Our book sales have been increasing, and the sales volume every day usually reaches 10- to 20-thousand. This is a good volume. Many customers from the culture industry in Hong Kong often come to us on purpose."

In addition to selling books, Trends Lounge also provides other creative products for sale such as pottery, fabric cloth and dolls, and creative home decorative products.

Xu Zhiqiang says to keep browsers onsite, the bookstore also offer simple meals, coffee and cocktails.

Similar to Trends Lounge is another Beijing bookstore - Page One from Singapore, which also attract customers in a way that's different from traditional bookstores.

Sun Qian, manager of the Page One bookstore at China World Mall, says 70 percent of the store's sales come from original edition English-language books as well as design and art books.

"We mainly target designers, architects and teachers and students from art schools and universities. Also, we want to attract the white-collar workers in the Guomao area and the foreigners in the CBD."

Sun Qian says providing original edition books meets the demand of these high-end consumers, and the store can make 10 percent more profit by selling imported original edition books compared to domestic books.

Sun says the Page One bookstore at China World Mall has generated very good revenue. Its record monthly revenue was once as high as one million yuan.

In the first half of this year, Page One opened a second store in Beijing, and later this year it will open a third one in the capital.

"I think the best way out for bookstores is diversifying their operations. Bookstores should meet the different demands of consumers. For example, when a family comes, the father can read a book here, the mother gets some cookbooks, and there are children's books for the kids. When they feel tired, they can have meal here. And if they want to buy some gifts and toys, their demand can also be met at the bookstore."

Many bookstore owners say no matter what, the pressure from high rent and competitive losses from online bookstores have been unavoidable. They hope they will able to obtain some preferential policy support from the government in terms of taxes and rental costs.

Currently, Shanghai has adopted measures to support bookstore businesses. The local government has earmarked 15 million yuan to fund the construction of a book distribution network. About 5 million yuan of the fund will be used to support small and medium-size bookstores. The rest will be used to subsidize privately owned bookstores.

For CRI, I am Zhang Wan.