Will online bookstores kill street bookstore

The emergence and development of the Internet in the last decade and especially in the last couple yearshas made it an inseparable part of life. E-commerce technology has facilitated the opening of the web-stores, so people can make their purchases directly on the internet and have them conveniently delivered them at home. Popular subjects who have found mercy for online customers include DVDs, videos, toys, clothes and games, among many other topics. Books have emerged as an extremely popular topic on the Internet. According to a recent study by Nielsen Online, more than 50 percent of users have purchased a book over the Internet in the last quarter of 2007.

Survey also discovered that almost 85 percent of the total online population had made at least one purchase over the Internet in recent times. The emergence of books such as popular online department has seen an increase in Internet giants like Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and eBay catering to book orders from around the world. Many customers come from developing countries like China, India, Vietnam, Brazil and Egypt. Traditionally independent bricks and mortar booksellers have always benefited from the continued demand for books. However, virtual bookstores are slowly making inroads into people's consciousness around the world. Traditionally, customers browse the brick and mortar stores and searching for books of their choice. Online Booksellers replace traditional bookcases with highly structured web pages. These sites display a number of book categories and books at the store along with their prices, descriptions and virtual browsing capabilities. Customers conveniently click on the category of their choice to choose the books they want. These books are added to the virtual shopping cart, and sales are made via a secure e-commerce gateway that is linked to a bank or accredit card processor.

Traditional shops find it hard to survive attacks from online chains such as Amazon and Barnes and Noble. But several studies by the American Booksellers Association discovered that traditional stores still represent a substantial part of the local economy. This may be partly correct to assume that online booksellers, drawing away business from conventional independent booksellers, but the fact is that independent bookstores also keep their businesses by inducing a loyalty factor amongst their existing client base.

Many people still love to flip through books before they ultimately make a purchase. That is where most local bookstores advantage by proving facilities such as the atmosphere and space to read and look into the shop premises. According to a recent study in San Francisco independent bookstores accounted for 50 percent of sales compared to 10 percent across the United States.

There is another dimension to this whole issue. It may seem that online booksellers take away business from local shops, but there is extreme competition among online booksellers as well. For example, the customers would never go to Barnes and Noble to buy their books if the usual Amazon users. Other online booksellers using a series of internet tactics to drive traffic to their websites.

To summarize, at this stage it is too early to say whether online sales will drive independent booksellers to shut down, but the current situation makes it clear that both will compete for supremacy in the human mind.