Midland Book Shop (tm)

What separates a physical bookstore from Amazon, is the experience of browsing through books, and experience the joy of discovering new books along the way. This is what separates bookstores from virtual stores. Today, I went to Midland along with my friend. While I was browsing, a lady was constantly surveilling us while we were going through the books. My friend and I went out for a short lunch break and came back to the bookstore to continue our search for books. When my friend and I were browsing the books, the owner came to the lady (who was literally patrolling us) and said to her “These people are here just to waste time”. Both of us were greatly offended at this remark but we nevertheless continued browsing the books. After some time, the lady comes up to me and said to me, “Do you even want to buy anything?” As far as I could see, the entire bookstore was empty. Nobody else was there. We were quietly browsing so we were not even disrupting anybody. Moreover, a lot of people came, browsed, and left without buying anything. Is it a crime to take your time when you are buying a book? Is it a crime to not buy a book within the first 15 minutes when you enter the bookstore and leave immediately? Today, I was treated like a trespasser, where I got cornered to either buy books immediately or to just leave. After this incident, my friend who was very excited did not buy anything. I, for one, just bought one book and quickly left. The behavior of the lady as well as the owner was extremely unprofessional and incompetent. Throughout our time at the bookstore, it felt as if our presence was irritating to the owner. It seems ironic that the very loyal customers who buy the books and support the bookstore have now become a nuisance for the owner. I have been going to the Midland bookstore for quite some time for the amazing collection of books that they have. Back then, I would even encourage my friends also to go there. The previous owner was always very kind and friendly. He always gave extremely good book recommendations also. I would like to remind the owner that most of the books are anyways available on Amazon and on discounted prices. People go to the bookstore because of the experience it provides to its customers. Why else would anybody go to a bookstore? But after such horrible and rude customer service, I would never go there again. And I would not recommend anybody to go there. It is not at all what it used to be. Just wanted to share my experience with anyone who remembers the old Midland, where you were free to explore, and the owner, in fact, helped you through his recommendations on what to look out for.