Street roots
9
Jan. 21, 2011
POWELL'S, from page 8
inventory on the Internet. And a t th at point, 1994, the
Internet was a social media, not an economic media. It
was against the informal rules, but you could get into a
lot of trouble if you tried to sell something on the
Internet when we started. But that was changing. We
weren’t the first to start selling books on the Internet
but we were certainly one of the first And then from
1994 to 2003 or so there was this great gold rush
opportunity to sell books on th e Internet, and lots of
people saw that happening and it became a very
competitive market and a crowded venue.
It s been a small part of our business and continues .
to be a small part. Then you have Amazon come in with
the Kindle and had the market share and the dollars to
make it work, and of course now you have the iPad. But
it’s only been in the last five years that there’s been a
serious competitor to the book.
J.Z.: In five and 10 years on, is Powell’s City o f Books
going to be the same place?
M.P.: It shouldn’t be. I told Emily when I signed the
business over that if we’re doing exactly th e same thing
in five years I’m going to take it back. Because you have
to be constantly adapting, finding new strategies to
present material and display it and what material you’re
displaying, and the mix between new and used, and all
of that needs constant attention and there’s an
evolution to all that. And more importantly what’s our
strategy for electronics? And she’s hard at work at
helping us find a way to be more relevant in that
electronic world.
This is very much a hold-and-see-what-happens
environm ent You watch Borders slowly slide over the
precipice and you thank God it’s not you. And you figure
out what they did wrong and what you can do to avoid
their fate.
J.Z.: Are you nostalgic for the way things were?
M.P.: I don’t think we’re in the buggy whip business
just y e t But I sometimes wonder if we’re going to be
the la s t I’m not nostalgic, but I enjoy, and still think
most people do, the printed book. It’s a question of how
much you have to accommodate the new technologies
and how much you continue to make what you do
important to people.
J.Z.: Wfow we talk about the new climate, I think of
WikiLeaks. What are your thoughts about that and the new
world o f journalism and distributing information? I know
censorship is a bailiwick o f yours.
M.P.: It is. I can’t say much about WikiLeaks, but it
used to be that publishers, rightly or wrongly - whether
they’re newspaper, book magazine, TV, radio —
exercised judgment, and th at judgment would be based
on quality, social mores. For example, you wouldn’t see
pornography or a variety of other things in p rin t
Mainstream publishers didn’t print what we call
pornography, and there was a holding-back ofO some
kind. Across m ost fronts now th at holding back has
evaporated, short of what’s illegal, and in some cases
what is illegal: Those books were clearly labeled; you
could choose to view them or riot. But I would say
books, Uke Madonna’s book, began to cross that
threshold, and it was in your face, And I think with the
Internet and that rush to get anything you can say said,
it doesn’t have to be verified for fact, and WikiLeaks is
probably an example of th at phenomenon. Whether it’s
good for the country or not, I don’t know. I personally
have a reservation about publishing something that puts
people’s lives at risk. I’m not putting th at standard out
there as a First Amendment standard. But diplomacy
can’t operate where everything is out in th e public. I ve
been in meetings where we’re trying to so rt out
Oregonian, nothing would happen, because when
you’re looking over your shoulder trying to second-’
guess every word you said and how it’s being viewed. It
stifles process.
By Jay Thiemeyer
J.Z.: How would you assess the current climate for
business in Portland?
T
E
R
N
A
T
for a decade roughly
during th e bulk of the seventies
I floated then sat
and drank
and drank and drank
through alleys, dead cars, buildings, highways
through the eighties and nineties till 2002
with all that came to that death
dealing garbage pail
life
riot my own
by a long shot
I merely stood by
watching
(or sat, rather sat)
myself from a distance remote walking a
thousand plus
miles a day from feed to feed and back again to wait again
dropping it wherever, oblivious
and content in my drained numb madness
I didn’t die but was helped
‘anonymous giving’ I call
what they did: intervention
the agency called it and it worked after a fashion
I still miss
th e freedom in that dream state
twenty years in the rain I forget
I forget all but the freedom me and my
myriad thoughts
racing nowhere
really just derangement, really bad
derangement if was and it doesn’t
get a bit better
no m atter how many times I attempt
th at solipsist’s derangement, that dream,
never amounts to freedom
the dream state
become an insult to the
brain;
lOOo don’t work no more
not even when chased with a bit
to e a t
Once not long ago I stuck my thumb out to follow it
wherever it would take me.
I carried my dream state derangement on my back
• in my knapsack, one long
bottle’s worth
what I got for my thumb-thinking
was a stolen knapsack
and a ride home in a squad car.
with only an admonition this time:
I almost pleaded
give me a charge, put some Kinda charge on me
don’t treat me like some goddam old man, I said,
in a low tired voice.
the bubble had burst without me
me and my thumb come to a sucked dry place
time to reload, someone suggested,
we think not
we truly think not
I’ll leave that childish innocence to another
dreamer lost in a bottle floating down through it
M.P.: I can tell you right now, the economy is not .
great. There are a lot of businesses'hurting and we’re
down a little b it How much of that is the e-book world
and how much of it is the economy, I have no way of
parsing that information. When you have unemployment
in excess
10 percent, that’s fewer dollars churning through:
Customers are more cautious; they’re buying less
expensive books. And so we have to be aware of those
situations.
I kind of feel like things are beginning to pick up a
little bit, and I don’t know why I say th a t This is the
only recession where I think people ate their way
through it. I don’t go to a restaurant that doesn’t seem
to be packed. But I don’t know if the restaurateurs
would agree with th a t And there are restaurants
closing, but then there are 600 food carts open, too.
It will come back, at some level, at some pace, and
there’s every indication th at it will be slow.
J.Z.: How much is in the hands o f the city, the efforts of
the Portland Business Alliance, by fellow businessmen
downtown? What can be done by the city to do better?
M.P.: There are lots of elements into why a business
is downtown and why it’s n o t There are a lot of reasons
why people do business in the suburbs: Free parking
and lots of it. Streets are arguably less congested,
access to the suburban customer, so you have the
Washington Squares of the world. I would say that
downtown has been relatively healthy. The Business
Alliance has done a great job of working on some of the
issues that are constraining - graffiti, street cleaning,
working with agencies to help on the homeless
situation. I think the business community here has a
good record to deal with some of the issues that make
downtown more challenging. And I think we have a very
h ealth y dow ntow n. T h e re are elements that I wish
weren’t there.
B ut I would say th at compared to other downtowns,
it’s a pretty vibrant central city. In my lifetime, certainly
in the last 20 years, virtually all th e arterial streets;
Mississippi, Alberta ...
J.Z.: There are a lot o f adorable shops opening, but
they’re also closing. And I wonder how you view these
changes in those communities, reflecting on your own
entrepreneurial experience when you see these businesses
pop up and then close in a year and half.
M.P.: Some close, but not all. But overall, I think
most people would say they appreciate what happened
on these streets and it’s why people move to Portland.
It’s economic vitality. T hat kind of move of the new
urban infrastructure and grittiness, if you want to call it
that, made it exciting. I grew up here and I came back
in 1979, and I could count on one hand the number of
restaurants I would consider taking out-of-town guests
to. That’s all changed. It might be seen as superficial,
but people find it fun, and that’s what makes life
interesting.
And books figure into th a t I’m not unmindful of what
Powell’s has meant to this community, sometimes I
can’t believe i t It’s a blessing;
J.Z.: Wfafr are you reading these days?
M.P.: Most recent book I picked up is on th e Norman
occupation on England, and I’ve been going through a
whole phase of Medieval history. The occasional
mystery or thriller. I read a couple of books a week. My
reading’s limited to after the dishes are washed.
co ffee b e a n
I N
Floater
I O
N
A
L
®
We tip our mugs to Coffee Bean International
for donating coffee to Street Roots and
keeping our vendors warm in the morning!
Thank you!
U
S
—
'* ■
DETOUR
\cafe^x
3035 S.E. Division • Portland, OR 97202
503.234.7499