THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, August 15, 1994 TAG: 9408150425
SECTION: BUSINESS WEEKLY PAGE: 11 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MICHAEL PEARSON, SPECIAL TO BUSINESS WEEKLY
LENGTH: Medium: 74 lines
There were few places to go in Hampton Roads for a cup of cappuccino and a conversation about Kafka.
Then book dealer Sarah Pishko recast J.M. Prince Ltd. as Prince Books & Coffeehouse.
Opening last month in a renovated wing of a downtown Norfolk office building at 109 Main St., the new bookstore typifies the challenge facing thousands of small retailers in Hampton Roads.
Among the array of superstores, discounters, chains and spunky independents, retailers must make their own shops stand out. Pishko opted for the ambiance of classics and coffee.
``I think the ambiance is critical to the identity of a bookstore,'' Pishko said. ``I think of this store as a community center, a place where people can gather, browse, talk about books.''
Small retailers like Pishko confront the kind of competition that corner grocers saw a generation earlier with the arrival of supermarkets.
In a few months, Barnes & Noble will come into Virginia Beach with a cavernous store selling books at discount prices.
``Barnes & Noble are a threat to a lot of independent bookstores,'' Pishko said. ``I'm looking at it more as a challenge than a threat. I knew it was inevitable. I knew they were coming.''
In Prince Books, people can linger, lounge in high-backed chairs next to racks stocked with newspapers, magazines and The New York Times Book Review. They can order soup, sandwiches, soft drinks and cappuccino, and relax at one of a dozen tables in the cafe, which covers 600 of the store's 3,000 square feet.
``I created the ambiance,'' Pishko said. ``But I don't know how to run the coffee makers.''
That chore's left to cafe manager Bill Prince, her brother.
As the name implies, superstores are big. They can cover 30,000 square feet and stock 100,000 books. In contrast, Prince holds 10,000 titles.
``But what they might not be able to offer is a sense of familiarity, an ability to respond to a variety of local interests,'' Pishko said. ``They might not be able to offer a simple sense of community.''
Prince, which was moved down the street from Selden Arcade, is one of the region's few places to mix the pleasures of reading, eating and chatting.
Book signings and readings are common fare at the store. It has contributed to the Old Dominion Literary Festival, and sold books by the festival's participants.
Owned by Pishko, the store was opened in 1982 as a joint venture with JoAnn Hofheimer. J.M. Prince came from Hofheimer's initials and Pishko's maiden name. A few years ago Pishko became the sole owner.
I've been blessed up to this point,'' Pishko said. ``When I started the store . . . it was something of a honeymoon. Things went very well. It wasn't until the late '80s that times got tough. Main Street was closed during the building of the new Marriott and the economy was down in general.''
Owning a bookstore had never been Pishko's dream. After she graduated with a degree in economics from the College of William and Mary in 1981, she worked in Scribner's Bookstore in Williamsburg while husband Bernard completed law school.
``I loved it,'' she said. ``Bookstores always seem to draw the most interesting people.''
MEMO: Michael Pearson is a professor of creative writing at Old Dominion
University.
ILLUSTRATION: Color photo by D. Kevin Elliott
"Barnes and Noble are a threat to a lot of independent bookstores,"
says Sarah Pishko, standing in her new downtown Norfolk store.
Partly because of the coming big-chain competition, she added the
ambience of a coffee shop.
by CNB