Borders Unveils New Digital-Friendly Concept Store

The new concept also offers taller light-inducing windows, stations for downloading music to an MP3 player (it's not currently iPod accessible) or to CD -- complete with printed cover art for $9.99. The LongPen digital device allows an author to autograph a book electronically from another location while interacting with the customers via video.

Borders plans to roll this concept out to all of its stores over the next several years in an effort to woo customers:

"We wanted to create a comfortable, easy to understand environment." - Rob Gruen, executive vice president of merchandising and marketing.

Borders CEO George Jones added "We wanted to build something compelling enough to make a customer drive five or 10 minutes past a competitor's store to get here." (Source: MLive.com)

As bricks-and-mortar book retailers try to retain customers vs. both their offline and online competitors, we are likely to see other similar initiatives which blend the benefits of the digital age with the joys of book browsing (turning pages, exploring new titles, etc.) -- a glaring weakness of online bookstores like Amazon (which incidentally powers Borders.com).

It's hard to say how the gambit will pay off in the long-run but in the near-term it should help rekindle interest in Borders. If customer service can deliver, perhaps they could even attract some customers who would like to be more digitally-inclined but need more hands-on support. Still I think it is a stretch to think that avid iPod users would frequent the new Borders concept.

But folks looking to publish a book of poetry, a short story or a family tree might be enticed into the store rather than trying to wrestle with it online.