How to Fix Barnes & Noble, Inc. (BKS)

Second, it’s inconsistent with Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE:BKS)’s struggle to survive, if not prosper, economically. This simply won’t happen in an environment in which employees view their customers as adversaries. When I observed the incident with the two parents above, I thought of this anecdote in Dale Carnagie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People:

I spent an evening in the dressing room of Howard Thurston the last time he appeared on Broadway — Thurston was the acknowledged dean of magicians. For forty years he had traveled all over the world, time and again, creating illusions, mystifying audiences, and making people gasp with astonishment. More than 60 million people had paid admission to his show, and he had made almost $2 million in profit.

I asked Mr. Thurston to tell me the secret of his success…

Did he have a superior knowledge of magic? No, he told me hundreds of books had been written about legerdemain and scores of people knew as much about it as he did. But he had two things that the others didn’t have. First, he had the ability to put his personality across the footlights… But, in addition to that, Thurston had a genuine interest in people. He told me that many magicians would look at the audience and say to themselves, “Well, there is a bunch of suckers out there, a bunch of hicks; I’ll fool them all right.” But Thurston’s method was totally different. He told me that every time he went on stage he said to himself: “I am grateful because these people come to see me. They make it possible for me to make my living in a very agreeable way. I’m going to give them the very best I possibly can.”

He declared he never stepped in front of the footlights without first saying to himself over and over: “I love my audience. I love my audience.” Ridiculous? Absurd? You are privileged to think anything you like. I am merely passing it on to you without comment as a recipe used by one of the most famous magicians of all time.

The point here is that Barnes & Noble can sell toys and games instead of books. It can hold more events at each of its stores. And it can improve its signage. But all of these are peripheral to the fundamental issue: If Barnes & Noble wants to survive, it needs to act that way. And it needs to do so every day, in every store, with every customer.

The article How to Fix Barnes & Noble originally appeared on Fool.com and is written by John Maxfield.

John Maxfield has no position in any stocks mentioned, and neither does The Motley Fool.

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