Today on the Scroll: A retail flaneur contemplates the survival of one of the last surviving slabs of 20th century Yonge and Dundas.

Mind Over Mood: Change How You Feel by Changing the Way You Think is one of the biggest-selling books these days at the World’s Biggest Bookstore, which might speak volumes about the clientele, but also the evolution of the enterprise itself.

The bookstore opened in 1980 at 20 Edward Street, just north of Yonge and Dundas, replacing the Olympia Edward Lanes — which contained 64 alleys on four levels including a section devoted to that quintessentially Canadian pastime, five-pin bowling. Prior to that, it was the site of a family-run woodworking and furniture factory, Spanner Products. World’s Biggest Bookstore reflected the idiosyncratic vision of Jack Cole, who had a Coles location on the corner of what’s now Yonge-Dundas Square — which co-existed with the WBB for the first several years — but this monstrosity could fit around a million volumes.

Never mind that the WBB hasn’t been able to claim its own title for many years — a Barnes and Noble at 5th Avenue and 18th Street in New York City boasts more floor space. And arguably a wider range of titles, since the selection at the World’s Biggest is tied to the supply chain of its owner, Indigo Books & Music.

The quirky role that the WBB plays in Indigo CEO Heather Reisman’s corporate framework seemed to be validated last October, when it hosted a virtual book signing by convicted felon Conrad Black, who — due to being forced to surrender his passport while awaiting sentencing — used Margaret Atwood’s trademarked LongPen to autograph his Richard Milhous Nixon doorstop, The Invisible Quest.  

What about the rest of the store, though? The intersection’s decade-long transformation is nearly complete. Sam the Record Man, the musical equivalent to the WBB, was shuttered — and the sentimentality for 20th century retail landmarks continues apace: Yonge Street video arcades won’t be able to pay their rising rent in quarters; Honest Ed’s isn’t likely long for this town now that its namsake has passed; Suspect Video on Queen West burned down at the same time a new movie, Be Kind Rewind, hangs its flimsy plot on the premise that a VHS-only video store is worth salvaging. Best to visit the World’s Biggest Bookstore before being forwarded a link to a petition arguing to save the place.

However, according to general manager Christine Haynes, it’s business as usual. Her affection for the store dates back to when she was $6.40/hour help, back in 1987, and returned a couple years ago. Her top-floor office offers a view of the Elmwood Spa’s historic mansion — not a blinding media tower billboard in sight.

“When I first started working here everything was manual,” she explains. “There was a room where the eight buyers sat all day, thumbing through catalogues, filling out those order sheets by hand.” What changed little were the gaudy florescent lights, the linoleum floors, and the shades of primarily yellow paint.

There’s some Indigo blue to be found, however, if mostly in the children’s section. In fact, the panoply of fonts seen throughout the WBB reflects several eras of brand identity, as it changed hands from Coles to Chapters to Indigo. The mishmash is worthy of the TTC, but Haynes boasts it only adds to the charm — those were, after all, the signs that the head office made available at the time.

But different executives had different ideas of what the store should be: Classrooms built for computer courses are now blocked off for storage. Plush seats for browsing were installed in line with the first era of Chapters superstores, until someone realized it made the store even more appealing to vagrants.

So, an advertising campaign in 1999 conceded the World’s Biggest Bookstore could never be anything but: The occasionally burnt out fluorescent tubes, absence of places to sit besides the step stools, and prices so low that even illiterates were shopping there played up the kitsch factor at the same time that the World’s Biggest Jean Store at Yonge and Dundas was being expropriated.

Then, a couple years later, Chapters was taken over by Indigo — and a cappuccino bar was installed somewhere around the science fiction section.

“The clientele who shopped there weren’t going to warm to such a huge changeover,” says Rachel McMillian, a four-year employee who initially found herself being trained to make lattes, as an adjunct to bookselling. “They were used to having things a certain way, and were almost resentful toward the idea.”

Back to new and discounted books, then, along with the expansion of a DVD department — where British television shows are the top sellers. The section once devoted to computers, and high-end stationery beforehand, is now stocked with discount cast-offs from the Indigo chain: Harry Potter merch, overstock of scented candles, last season’s garden supplies, and 75 per cent off rattan trays.

The sign outside still says Bookstore, though – it’s so big they didn’t even try covering it up when the area was dressed as an ersatz Harlem for The Incredible Hulk movie – and the most prominent displays reflect customer demand: Dozens of books in the Dummies series, lotsa Manga, a loyal clientele for books on religion and crafts, and mystery and sci-fi novels. Display tables get some cheeky charm with category signs like “Midlife, What?!” and “Life is Cheap: Read a Life”.

Less prominent are dog-eared coffee table books devoted to erotic photography instruction, and the well-thumbed adult magazine section is evidently long gone. Some of that action shifted next door, during the past decade, to the used and remaindered bookstore BMV.

“The selection at the World’s Biggest always amazed me when I was a kid coming down,” says Mike Murray, a five-year veteran of the Edward Street BMV, now working in their Annex location. “It’s definitely gone downhill since the Indigo takeover — although I would go there to get coffee when I worked down there.

“The competition is probably good for both stores, though. At first, it was BMV who were getting spillover, and now it’s the other way around — since people are going to be looking for a cheaper copy first. But I can’t tell you the number of people who used to walk in, or even call, and think that BMV was the World’s Biggest.”

Ian Donker of Book City —which, up until last week, had a store based at the Yonge and Charles intersection that once boasted the flagship Coles — points to the fact that a supersized retailer is no longer a unique concept was enough to diminish the World’s Biggest Bookstore.

“It’s always been a bit of an ugly duckling,” he says. “I don’t think anyone has given it much thought in many years, that’s all. How can something that was once so important fade into a non-entity? It never comes up in conversations.”

But it’s still there, all 65,000 square feet of floor space, surviving if not thriving as the rest of the area is redefined with sprouting Bay Street condos on one end of the sidestreet, and Times Square lite taking its well-overdue shape on the other.

The ghostly outline of the Coles name, sketched five times, can still be seen on the left end of the red-on-white WBB marquee — patriarch Jack Cole died in 1997 but, far as anyone seems to know, the family still owns this slab of real estate.

Does the lack of corporate pretense keeps the World’s Biggest Bookstore alive?

“I have customers in here all the time who make comments like, ‘I would never set foot in that Indigo store’,” says Haynes. “And I just nod my head and smile.”

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