A sign posted in Avid Bookshop, Athens, Ga., warning customers about the "community-unfriendly website named after a South American River" is "typical of owner Janet Geddis's approach to competing against Amazon's existential threat--educate consumers, but don't be shrill about it," Flagpole reported in an article headlined "Avid Bookshop Is Fighting Amazon with Kindness."
"When customers mention Amazon, it's usually students who may not have the experience of shopping in a local bookstore before," Geddis said. "We don't want them to feel guilty. You're free to shop where you want to shop."
She acknowledged, however, that while "it's hard to talk to [students] about that without being preachy," the momentum is starting to change as young interns at the bookshop clue their classmates in to Avid's offerings. Geddis added that she and her staff "are happy to discuss the pros and cons of shopping online versus shopping at a locally owned business (better service, giving back to the community) and why Avid's prices are by necessity higher than Amazon's (overhead, lack of clout with publishers)," Flagpole noted.
"Sometimes, those customers transfer the majority of their business to us, which is kind of rad," she said.
