I suppose it’s sort of an open secret what chain The Bookstore is, especially when there’s a photo of me standing in front of a Borders sign.

Here’s an article from this week’s Publisher’s Weekly about the financial state of Borders:

Chairman Ron Marshall called results in the quarter “difficult and disappointing” which he attributed to higher costs than expected in preparing the stores for the holidays as well as lower than expected sales from promotional programs. Average ticket transaction was down in the period at both the superstores and Walden. Still, Marshall said that with the exception of some pockets on the West Coast he is pleased with the conditions of the stores at the beginning of the holiday season. The retailer’s in-stock position is “much better” than a year ago, Marshall said and inventories in the core book group will be up between 4% to 7%.

So in the face of this, Corporate Leadership made the logical conclusion: they cut payroll at every store.

(Logical? It’s retarded).

As you might guess, payroll is the amount of budget the Bookstore has to staff employees. This actually has less to do with the individual wage a Bookseller, Barista, or Cashier makes, and more to do with the number or staffing hours the Bookstore is allowed to schedule people. So, for example, it’s not a matter of “we only have $9,000 to spend this week on employee pay”, but “we can only schedule 1,000 hours.”

What does this mean for you? Well, basically what it means is that if you need help finding a book? Good luck. Because with the Christmas season upon us, every single available employee is at the register bank.

Let me run down minimum staffing for the store that I work at, which is a two-level superstore.

On the main level, there are three stations that need a minimum of one employee each: the Main Information Desk, the Register Bank/Cashwrap, and the Cafe. On the lower level, you need a minimum of one employee at the Music Information Desk (misnomer: station is responsible for all information requests for that floor). Throw in a manager, and on paper, it’s possible to staff the store with five people.

Yeah. Sure. We’ve got a 35,000 square feet store and during a typical weekday our sales top $25,000. But this isn’t “typical” season: this is Christmas season, where for retail, even if it’s slower than normal, or slower than expected, it’s still pretty damned busy.

Who cuts staff during the busiest retail season of the damn year?

Oh, right, Borders. (You’d think I’d know that since this was the whole point of the post).

Ideally, here is how the store should be minimally staffed:

On the lower level, at least two employees: one in the Kid’s section, who can handle all requests from the stairs to the front of the store on that level, the other who can handle all requests for the Media Sections, as well as anything from the stairs to the back of the store. On the upper level, at least three employees stationed at the Registers, two at Information, two at the Cafe, and at least one (preferably two) assigned to Recovery (which means that pile of magazines you took off the racks to read and then just left on a chair because you’re inconsiderate like that? People on Recovery are the ones who’ll act like your mommy and put them back).

This staffing arrangement allows for flexibility: if it’s slow, Register staff can be pulled to assist at Information or with Recovery. If it’s busy, the staffer at Kids, or the Recovery staffers, or the second person at Main Info, can be sent to assist at the Registers while still maintaining an employee at each station.

Instead, Thursday night (the last weeknight I worked), Main Information was not staffed at all, because the person who was supposed to be there was needed at the Registers. There was no one working Recovery, and as Corporate has limited our hours to such a degree, we can’t stay past closing to get it all re-shelved (because all those half hours add up real quick), and our night crews’ hours have been cut, so with a flood of new product coming in every business day, we’ve got half the people to try to get it put out on the floor: so quite soon, if you’re looking for a book and it’s not on the shelf but the computer says it is in the store, an employee will point at a library cart or two behind Info, which is piled haphazardly high with books, and say, “It might be in there, somewhere.”

And if it’s not there, it’s in a box somewhere in the backroom. Good luck finding someone to check for that book you absolutely need at the last moment.