In which case why not move to somewhere else in the centre of Manchester? There are plenty of empty shops. Amazon is presumably partly to blame and has there perhaps also been a decline in book purchasing generally?
I've been a bookseller for the past 30 years. The printed book, as opposed to Kindle upload, is still in fine fettle, sales by volume being up last year from 2014. However, the bookshop in this and some other countries, like the USA, is in terminal decline, in this country hit first by the ending of the Net Book Agreement, which saw the likes of Tesco and Asda creaming off the bestselling titles 20 years ago, and, of course, the rise of Amazon in the last 15 years, particularly the last 5 or 6. Some countries, like France, protect their bookshops to an extent at least with some success, but in market-orientated GB all we get is waffle about how important bookshops are, particularly the rapidly-disappearing independent, with absolutely no financial input, the only miserly concession being some may be able to claim the business rate reliefs available to all shops below a certain rateable value.
On the subject of transport books, what proportion of them are given any discount whatsoever by Amazon? I would say less than a sixth, and, even then, usually by 10% or less. So everyone who goes to a bookshop, looks at the books on display, then decides to purchase one, but not there and then, but later online with Amazon, cannot then complain when the shop no longer finds it viable to keep going. Cause and effect! Now you won't know whether that book is worth buying until Yodel or whoever has made the delivery. A shame for those who didn't contribute to this situation, but, for everyone else, you've made your bed, etc.
), I will always have a look at first before ordering. Most especially if it's from a new company I've never ordered from before. This also applies to new atlases, one reason why I haven't yet got the most recent Baker is because my cursory glance at one on 2015's annual railtour showed, quite frankly, a new layout that I don't like!
