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Bookstore Arrives, and Sides Are Taken

Battle of the independents: Books & Books opened in July on Main Street in Westhampton Beach, N.Y., around the corner from the new location of the Open Book, below.Credit...Nicole Bengiveno/The New York Times

WESTHAMPTON BEACH, N.Y. — Ever since Books & Books opened its doors on Main Street here last month, it has missed out on some of the adulation usually reserved for new independent bookstores in the age of Amazon.

Several storeowners nearby have ordered their staffs not to shop there. Indignant older women have marched inside the bookstore to yell at employees. And someone, or perhaps several someones, may have sneakily placed used chewing gum between the pages of new books.

The animosity seems to have stemmed from the fact that Books & Books moved in when there was already an independent bookstore, the Open Book, around the corner. And as some people saw it, there was no room for another one.

Terry Lucas, a librarian and the owner of the Open Book, which she founded in 1999, said Books & Books is on a course to put her already struggling store out of business.

The dueling bookstores have caused a bit of summer drama in this quiet, laid-back town on the south fork of Long Island, where much of the commercial activity happens on Main Street, a tidy stretch lined with restaurants, real estate offices and boutiques.

“You’d think the thing that was going to kill the little town bookstore was the e-reader,” said Glenn Dorskind, a high school English teacher and friend of Ms. Lucas’s. “But the thing that’s killing it is another bookstore.”

Not that there is anything wrong with Books & Books, the challenger in this David-versus-slightly-bigger-David story. It occupies a sleek, 2,000-square-foot space with spotlessly modern décor, gleaming track lighting and tastefully arranged shelves of best sellers, poetry volumes and children’s picture books. Even its opponents, some of whom have gone inside or peeked through the enormous front windows, have grudgingly admitted that it is a beautiful place.

“There’s no legal or ethical principle that says you don’t open a second store of some kind because someone else has the first one,” said James Kramon, a longtime summer resident here.

Jack McKeown, one of the owners of Books & Books, said he believed — and the statistical research that he had conducted clearly showed — that there was plenty of room for another bookstore in Westhampton Beach. “We have been subjected to some pretty unfair treatment by a very small minority of people,” he said. “My attitude is to take the high road here and not engage in any of this. I’m not even going to get engaged.”

On a recent Saturday afternoon, his store attracted a steady stream of shoppers, who browsed new releases by Julie Orringer, Martin Amis and Nelson DeMille. Mr. McKeown said that he had been “much busier than we even anticipated” and that the store — which is independently owned but affiliated with the Books & Books stores in South Florida and Grand Cayman — had lined up a busy calendar of author events this month, the peak of the summer season.

The Open Book, a smaller, cozy shop about a dozen storefronts away, sells many of the same books at the same prices, along with a few toys, aromatherapy candles and writing journals.

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Terry Lucas founded Open Book in 1999. The new location now has less foot traffic.Credit...Nicole Bengiveno/The New York Times

The tale of two bookstores began last winter after Ms. Lucas signed a lease on a new building that was more affordable than her old space on Main Street but on a side street with less foot traffic. Not long after, her mail carrier told her that a new bookstore was coming to town. Ms. Lucas flew into a panic, calling other business owners to see if they had any information. Soon, she said, Mr. McKeown stopped by her store in its new location.

Mr. McKeown, a former publishing executive in Manhattan, was polite but businesslike, she said. Then, she said, he offered to hire her as a consultant to Books & Books.

“It was like somebody punched me,” Ms. Lucas said. “I said: ‘I don’t know why you’re coming here to ask me this. Are you under the assumption that I’m going to go out of business?’ And he said, ‘Yes.’ ”

Mr. McKeown declined to comment on the conversation. Books & Books opened in early July, and Ms. Lucas said she saw her sales drop “the minute it opened up.” Ms. Lucas admitted that her new location on Glovers Lane, slightly off Main Street, probably would have resulted in lower sales even if Books & Books did not exist.

Some business owners on Main Street, who have known Ms. Lucas for years, were appalled. “It’s just a shame to open up another bookstore when it’s such a small town,” said Suzanne Marchisello, the owner of a boutique down the block from Books & Books.

Ms. Lucas and her staff began devising ways to compete. One of her employees donned a sandwich board and walked along Main Street, pointing passers-by in the direction of the Open Book. (Sometimes they handed out brightly colored balloons to children.)

In June a group of Ms. Lucas’s supporters sent a letter to the American Booksellers Association, the trade group for independent bookstores, alerting it to the situation in Westhampton Beach.

Meg Smith, a spokeswoman for the association, said the board of directors did receive the letter, and responded to it. “Our general feeling is that we don’t regulate the openings of bookstores,” Ms. Smith said.

At Mustique, a clothing store between Books & Books and the Open Book, a sign behind the counter urges customers to patronize the Open Book. Every Saturday employees of Sydney’s, a catering company on Main Street, wear identical T-shirts reading, “I ♥ The Open Book, Your Community Bookstore.”

“I have a lot of clients who just will not shop in there,” Erin Finley, the owner of Sydney’s, said of Books & Books. “It’s really hard with Barnes & Noble and Borders and everybody else. She didn’t need competition right there on Main Street.”

Ms. Lucas insisted that she had never gone into the store and was not responsible for any vandalism. (Mr. McKeown declined to comment on rumors that his books have been defaced with gum.) When Ms. Lucas has errands to run, she crosses the street so that she will not walk directly by Books & Books. Her children and employees have been ordered to keep their distance.

For now, anyway. Mr. Kramon said he was afraid the Open Book would not make it through the winter. “If I had to predict,” he said, “they won’t both be here a year from now.”

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section C, Page 1 of the New York edition with the headline: Bookstore Arrives, And Sides Are Taken. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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