The owner of the Harvard Book Store, a landmark that has been in the same family for 76 years, has put the store up for sale. Frank Kramer, 66, whose father started the business in 1932, said he is selling the store “because I've been doing it for 46 years and it's time to move on to something new in my life.” Another reason, he said, is to ensure that the store goes to an owner who will be committed to it long into the future. He said the store is profitable and that he is in no rush to sell. “The role of a bookstore in a physical place must continue, and I want it to,” Kramer said Tuesday. He said he wants to put more time and effort into Cambridge Local First, an organization of locally owned businesses that he confounded. His father, Mark Kramer, founded the store on what is now John F. Kennedy Street, mainly to sell used books, later expanding into academic books - not textbooks - but intellectual works that would be assigned by college professors. Later the store moved to its present location on Massachusetts Avenue at Plympton Street. Frank Kramer later expanded it into a general bookstore. In recent years, as other bookstores have failed, Harvard Book Store has become a destination for tourists visiting Harvard Square and the university. “It is very bittersweet, because he has been such a leader in the industry,” said Dana Brigham, co-owner of Brookline Booksmith, “especially during the last few years, with the advent of the chains and the Internet. He's the model of how to do it right: their author events, customer-loyalty programs, their e-mail newsletter.” Kramer was a senior philosophy major at Boston University when his father died unexpectedly in 1962. At the time, he decided to try running the family business for a while, he says, “until I figured out what I wanted to do with my life.” He never left. Harvard Book Store, which leases its 5,500-square-foot space from the university, was founded at a time when almost all fiction and nonfiction were sold through independently owned shops. The business has changed radically. Besides the advent of giant big-box chains such as Barnes & Noble and Borders - and nonspecialty retailers such as Wal-Mart, Target, and grocery stores - Internet operators such as Amazon.com have lured millions of book buyers away from stores. The pressures have driven thousands of smaller independent operators out of business. The casualties have included the Old Corner Bookstore, Buddenbrooks, and Lauriat's in Boston, and Reading International and WordsWorth in Cambridge. Still, independent operators have managed to succeed if they have established customers, a strong service orientation, good location, and reasonable lease costs. Harvard Book Store is considered to be in the top tier of independent stores nationally, along with Tattered Cover Book Store in Denver, Cody's Books in San Francisco, and Powell's Books in Portland, Ore. Since it's almost impossible to compete with megachains and Amazon.com on price, independents learned to build customer loyalty with author events and personal service. “They're one of the finest bookstores in the country,” said Dale Szczeblowski, general manager of Porter Square Books in Cambridge. “They have set a real example. Frank said that when he took over the store, to the question of what books to stock, he would ask the customers. That was how he learned.” A talent for business also helped. “Frank always paid attention to the business end of things,” said general manager Carole Horne, who joined the store in 1974. “When I started, you would go to classes held by the ABA (American Booksellers Association), and it was assumed that you were not a business person but a book lover who wanted to run a bookstore. I quickly figured out that I could learn a lot from Frank, and that if I wanted to be a successful bookseller I had to do more than read and talk about books.” Horne said that Harvard was one of the first independents to adopt inventory-control software, in the 1980s, and to carry paperbacks as a product line equal in importance to hardcovers. The store is always a busy place, which is partly a function of its location, across the street from Harvard Yard. Kramer said atmosphere is one of the essential elements that give him hope for the future of the traditional bookstore. “People enjoy the physical experience of being surrounded by books and literature,” he said. - The Boston Globe __
