Waldenbooks

Waldenbooks (formally Waldens), operated by the Walden Book Company, Inc., was an American shopping mall-based bookstore chain and a subsidiary of Borders Group. The chain also ran a video game and software chain under the name Waldensoftware as well as a children's edutainment chain under Walden Kids. In 2011 the chain was liquidated in bankruptcy.

History

On March 4, 1933, Lawrence Hoyt (1902–1982), a former sales manager for Simon & Schuster, opened a rental library within leased space inside a Bridgeport, Connecticut department store under the name Walden Book Company. Within fifteen years, it had grown to over 250 locations in leased locations within various department stores. With the increased availability of low cost paperbacks after the Second World War, rental library services were eventually replaced with retail book selling.

In 1962, he opened his first stand-alone bookstore in Pittsburgh; by 1981, it had become the first bookstore chain to have stores in every state. In 1969, it was purchased by the Broadway Hale Stores, a California-based department stores holding company that was later renamed Carter Hawley Hale in 1974. For the stand-alone bookstores, the company initially traded under the name Walden Books. During the 1970s, the company gradually changed their trade name to Waldenbooks.