BOOKSELLERS SUING CHAINS.Byline: Enrique Rivero Daily News Staff Writer Nearly two dozen independent booksellers - including some from the Los Angeles Los Angeles (lôs ăn`jələs, lŏs, ăn`jəlēz'), city (1990 pop. 3,485,398), seat of Los Angeles co., S Calif.; inc. 1850. area - are suing the Barnes & Noble and Borders bookstore chains, claiming they use their clout to get special discounts and preferential treatment from publishers. The antitrust suit, filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California by the American Booksellers Association, charges that the chains are cutting secret deals with publishers that give them an unfair advantage over the independents, which don't get the same discounts. ``It's the overwhelming power of the chain stores that are influencing and inducing these illegalities,'' said Avin Mark Domnitz, executive director of the Tarrytown, N.Y.-based ABA. New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of City-based Barnes & Noble Inc. and Ann Arbor Ann Arbor, city (1990 pop. 109,592), seat of Washtenaw co., S Mich., on the Huron River; inc. 1851. It is a research and educational center, with a large number of government and industrial research and development firms, many in high-technology fields such as , Mich.-based Borders Group Inc. said in separate statements they had not seen the suit and could not comment. But both said they had done nothing illegal. ``Programs that are available to us are made available to booksellers across America,'' Barnes & Noble said in its statement. Barnes & Noble operates the Barnes & Noble, Bookstar, B. Dalton, Doubleday and Scribner bookstores. Borders owns the Borders and Waldenbooks chains. The suit accuses the two companies of violating the Robinson-Patman Act Robinson-Patman Act, passed by the U.S. Congress in 1936 to supplement the Clayton Antitrust Act. The act, advanced by Congressman Wright Patman, forbade any person or firm engaged in interstate commerce to discriminate in price to different purchasers of the same , enacted in 1936 ``to curb and prohibit all devices by which large buyers gained discriminatory preferences over smaller ones by virtue of their greater purchasing power Purchasing Power 1. The value of a currency expressed in terms of the amount of goods or services that one unit of money can buy. Purchasing power is important because, all else being equal, inflation decreases the amount of goods or services you'd be able to purchase. 2. ,'' according to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. the suit. It also charges them with violating the California Unfair Trade Practices Act prohibiting large chains from improper competitive practices. The ABA in 1994 had sued seven large and small publishers for similar alleged violations. That suit was settled in 1996, Domnitz said. Joining suit Among the bookstores that have joined the American Booksellers Association's lawsuit are: Book Soup, West Hollywood West Hollywood A community of southern California northeast of Beverly Hills. It is mainly residential. Population: 36,600. . Dutton's Brentwood Books, Brentwood. Midnight Special Bookstore, Santa Monica. Ventura Book Store, Ventura. CAPTION(S): Box BOX Joining suit (see text) |
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