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A New Age You've Got Mail

You've Got Mail?

On November 22, 2019, an Amazon Books Store opened in Nashville’s very own Mall at Green Hills. It’s convenient: pick up a vacation novel, a skillet, and your niece’s birthday present in the same trip, and you can return any unwanted online purchases without paying shipping. It’s economy boosting: Amazon promised to hire 5,000 local workers once they open their Operations Center of Excellence after the store gets settled. It’s cheap: pick up books and other goods for Amazon prices. 

Although, it’s not as simple as one, two, three. Local businesses as well as their patrons worry about the influence this installment could have on profits, but more importantly, the landscape and need for independent business owners and bookstores. Local businesses such as Parnassus Books, which is right across from the landing zone of Amazon’s bombshell, and The Bookshop, in East Nashville, are not so worried about their profits, but rather, about their community. Karen Hayes and Ann Patchett co-own Parnassus Books. Ann Patchett spoke to the Los Angeles Times, “They don’t have a deaf border collie who jumps through hoops”. Marlee, one of the shop dogs at Parnassus, is an analogy for a greater topic: Amazon Books Store is not Parnassus Books, and Parnassus is not Amazon. Yes, Amazon is convenient, economy boosting, and cheap, but it cannot provide the level of service, experience, community building, credibility, and charm that Parnassus and other local booksellers like it excel in. As a Nashvillian, I have been to both Parnassus Books and the Amazon Books Store since its opening in the mall. At Parnassus, you are greeted by shop dogs and handed a flyer for a book from a new author. Book experts in the form of kind salespeople find your next literary love. As you browse, lovely chalk boards and charming ladders give curb-appeal to the sections. Handwritten recommendations line the shelves, while the strictly Nashville section reminds you of the store’s location, charming to locals and tourists alike. Walking into Amazon Books Store is akin to walking into a warehouse. The hustle of people, a cold, metal floor, and the diversification of wares (from pots, to kindles, to travel books, to Barbies: it’s all there) made me leave the store out of sheer discomfort.

Analogous to Fox Books and The Shop Around the Corner in 1998’s You’ve Got Mail, Amazon Books Store and Parnassus is the same story, different era. The film ends as an upper, but not on the account of small business success. While the movie closes with Joe Fox and Kathleen Kelly finding a romantic relationship, The Shop Around the Corner does not get such a happy ending, as it closes after being overshadowed by Fox Books. While the plot may be the same, the ending will not be. Chain stores and multi-brand, multi-media, international conglomerates cannot overshadow local authentic, small-scale start-ups simply because they are in two completely different realms. Amazon and Amazon Books Stores are practical, online tools that just happen to have stores so returning is made easier. Parnassus Books and other independent bookstores like it are about the experience. The hunt for the perfect read, the community of readers, the ability to sit and stay awhile, and simplistic charm make independents who they truly are. While it may seem as if Amazon is an overshadowing cumulus nimbus hovering over the market for books in Green Hills, this is not the case because patrons go to both stores for separate wares and experiences. Remember, You’ve Got Mail is just a movie.






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