The Last Chapter: Goering’s Books Closes Its Doors

By Henry Taksier

“If these walls could sing, they’d sing a hundred songs. And if these walls could talk, they’d say they’d seen it coming all along.” – The Bouncing Souls

For 35 years, Goerings Book Store has struggled to survive in Gainesville’s increasingly corporate market. Located on 1717 NW First Ave., behind midtown, it was a place for students, professors and Gainesville residents to meet, talk about literature and browse titles by local authors. In a few weeks, its shelves will be empty. By March, even the shelves will be gone, and its doors will close permanently.

Remy Boucias, a UF journalism junior who grew up in Gainesville, recalls tagging along with his mom to visit Goerings as a kid.

“I really liked the environment,” Boucias said. “It was better than, say, Borders or Books-A-Million. A lot of it had to do with the owner, Tom Rider. He’d always be at the front desk with quirky books to show me – stuff I wouldn’t have read otherwise.”

Boucias appreciated seeing work there by local authors.

“When you go to a chain store, you just get the New York Times best sellers list,” he said. “You don’t get exposed to anything from your community.”

In addition to providing work by local authors, Goerings held events, such as book signings, which created a sense of literary community. UF English Professor Padgett Powell, a local author himself, has patronized Goerings since 1984.

Powell and other professors like him supported Goerings each semester by sending the store exclusive textbook orders. He expressed frustration with the UF Bookstore’s poor quality of service and the fact that they only stocked a set percentage of books ordered by each professor to prevent overstocking the inventory.

“If you told Goerings you had 30 students, Goerings would order 30 books,” Powell said. “They handled our textbooks with a moment’s notice. We sometimes ordered books after classes began, the way it should be done, not as we’re doing it now, so far in advance that you forgot what you ordered for your classes.

The drawback is that exclusive orders leave students with fewer choices when it comes to where their textbooks come from. This would have been a serious problem had Goerings chosen to take advantage of the situation by charging more.

“The prices were very reasonable,” said Hanny Lane, a UF economics and math junior. “And the people there were very friendly.”

Naturally, the UF Bookstore had serious competitive advantages, such as its ideal location and its affiliation with the University.

Until 2000, UF owned and operated its own bookstore located at The Hub. The decision was made in 2000 to build a new bookstore and welcome center. The Business Services Division of UF contributed $10 million to the project. Follett Higher Education Group contributed $2 million. Student fees contributed $6.3 million.

From 2000 on, Follett owned and controlled the campus bookstore. For the first $10 million made by the bookstore in a given year, the university got 10.75 percent. If the profits reached $15 million, the university got 11 percent.

“All the money made at Goerings stays in the Gainesville community,” said Tom Rider, a co-owner of Goerings since 1981. “Most of the money made at the campus store goes back to Chicago, where Follett Enterprise keeps its headquarters.”

The UF Bookstore may have been run by a $2.5 billion dollar corporation, but they could not match the level of service that Goerings Book Store provided.

“I don’t go to the UF Bookstore,” said UF junior Lindsey Green. “They’re not as interested in serving students as they are in making money, as is apparent in their prices. And they have terrible customer service.”

So Goerings remained competitive, despite the factors stacked against them.

“As chain bookstores flooded in, small bookstores…began to close,” Rider said.

Rider said each chain store controls such a massive sector of the market that publishers can’t force them to pay for their books on time. The publishers then have to make up for this by tightening restrictions on independent stores, like Goerings.

Still, Goerings prevailed because professors chose to support them.

“I ordered all my textbooks for all my classes at Goerings before they stopped doing textbook orders this semester,” said Elise Takehana, a UF graduate student who teaches literature and writing courses. “Goerings had so many texts that you don’t see anywhere else. There’s also a level of service here that you don’t get at other stores.”

Why, then, did Goerings fail?

State legislation requires professors to post their textbook requirements online at least 30 days before classes start. This gives students more time to compare textbook prices and, if necessary, order textbooks online.

The University’s Office of the Provost is stricter about this than the state government. Professors are required to post their textbook requirements online two to five months before classes start. Otherwise, their departments get fined. The textbook information, posted online, can then be accessed by local bookstores. This effectively ends the ability of professors to place exclusive textbook orders, which were the life support of Goerings.

Goerings will clearly be missed by students and professors looking for noncommercial sources of literature and conversation. To prevent this sort of tragedy from happening again, Tom Rider suggests that sympathetic students do their best to venture off campus and support local businesses. After all, they may not be around for much longer.