The Stern-Verlag bookstore, the largest bookstore in Düsseldorf, Germany, is closing on March 31, the Rheinische Post confirmed. Some 113 jobs will be lost. The store was founded in 1900.
Owner Klaus Janssen, 80 and grandson of the founder, said that the 54,000-square-foot operation had become financially untenable. In particular, the store's various sections and mezzanines were conducive to sales but were expensive to operate. If the store were to be rebuilt in a more economical way, he said, it would take two years. Online competition and the opening of two bricks-and-mortar competitors, Mayersche and Thalia, in Düsseldorf, had also hurt business.
The branch bookstore at Heine University will also close. Janssen plans to continue the store's mail-order operation.