I have the answer

Dear Books a Million, I have the answer as to why you are closing stores.

I visited the Books a Million in Huntsville today to spend my two giftcards and left in a state of complete dissatisfaction.

To begin with, there were not enough sales personnel to help customers. You know how Barnes & Noble ALWAYS has at least one person in the customer service section in the center of the store? BAM has a customer service section, too; but, it was empty the entire time I was in the store, unless someone was paged to go there. That meant that a customer had to ask for assistance in order to get attention. I don't like that.

I waited for the customer service person to help me with a few author's names. They didn't have either book I was looking for. So, I perused the sale aisles until a few more books came to mind. I went back to customer service. No one. I went up to the checkout and asked her to help me. She paged the customer service person. I waited there while she helped someone with a vampire series. They chatted until the loudspeaker said, "Tammy, please come to the front for a void." She PASSED me to go to the front. There were two people waiting behind me by this time...well, you get the idea. I had to wait. Then, I couldn't find either of those books, either, even though she assured me that they were both available.

So, time to check out. No one to pay. No one for any of the five registers at the front. I waited. And waited. And waited. So did everyone behind me. Evidently, the woman manning the cash registers had to go over to the coffee bar (Joe Muggs) to fix an issue with a coffee machine.

So, BAM, here is the issue: you are losing money so you cut hours and personnel. Customers come in to buy and become frustrated because they can't get the help they need. It's difficult to find items and there is no one around to assist. So, the customers go to another book store. Because we don't care where we go, we just want our books in the shortest amount of time for the l

east amount of money. You are not meeting at need and you are going to go out of business.

The End.