Bookseller Barnes & Noble returning to Coral Springs

Book and coffee lovers in Coral Springs have a reason to cheer: Barnes & Noble is returning to its longtime home in The Walk at University.

“It’s good news for the community and good for the shopping center to have them back,” said Charlie Ladd, president of Barron Real Estate in Fort Lauderdale, which represents The Walk’s owner, Amera Group.

Ladd said he expects a downsized version of Barnes & Noble to reopen at the site sometime this fall.

A Barnes & Noble spokeswoman did not immediately respond to questions seeking to confirm the decision to return. But several building permits filed with the city on April 7 identified the applicant as “Barnes & Noble Tenant Improvement” and Ladd confirmed that the company applied for the permits.

“They’re in a hurry to get the store open, and they don’t want to screw around,” he said.

The venerable bookseller has been absent from its original home — the 27,000 square foot building that anchors the upscale retail development on North University Drive — since moving out last February.

The company had approached its landlords in 2019 as its lease was about to expire and explained that competition from digital media and online retailers like Amazon had eaten into its sales to the point it could no longer afford the rent for such a large store.

Amera offered to subdivide the building to accommodate two tenants and lease half back to Barnes & Noble at a reduced price.

Barnes & Noble said it hoped it could return and even posted

signs before it closed urging customers to go to its website and express their support for seeing it come back.

But as the companies neared agreement on lease terms, the pandemic hit and forced Barnes & Noble to temporarily close most of its stores. Last June, Ladd said Amera hoped the lease deal could move forward when the world reopened.

Meanwhile, Trader Joe’s became the first tenant to move into the newly divided space. It opened on Oct. 30, capping a yearslong campaign by Amera and local fans to bring the cult-favorite grocery chain to the city.

Barnes & Noble developed its own cult following developed over decades hosting community events, book signings, charity drives and summer reading programs, or just providing a welcoming spot for readers to spend time. Customers’ loyalty enabled it to survive the last two decades of competition that drove familiar chains Borders and Crown Books out of business.

Bill Gralnick, an author and blogger for a Coral Springs community website, recently wrote that residents asked city officials at a citizen forum whether Barnes & Noble planned to return.

In his blog, Gralnick has written about the hours he has spent at various Barnes & Nobles, signing his books or browsing others’ titles.

“I happen to love Barnes & Noble and always liked wandering around bookstores, especially a place like Barnes & Noble that has so much more than books,” he said in an interview Friday. Particularly at The Walk at University,

“Barnes & Noble had a lot of added value for a diverse group of consumers who would go there for one thing and then as long as they were there, go into other stores. Or they would be there shopping at a store and see Barnes & Noble and have an epiphany: ‘I always wanted that book,’ and they’d go in and buy it.”

SOUTH FLORIDA SUN SENTINEL After a year-long absence, Barnes & Noble has pulled building permits in Coral Springs as it prepares to return to its old building on North University Drive, next to the new Trader Joe’s. It will occupy about half of its former space, but fans are happy to hear that it’s coming back in any form.