Brand Bookshop to close after 29 years

Glendale’s Brand Bookshop will close after 29 years in business. Owner Jerome Joseph, now in his mid-80s, has decided to retire.

All of Brand Bookstore’s stock will go on sale Tuesday, marked down 50%.

A used bookstore with a vast, eclectic selection, Brand Bookshop was one of the largest bookstores of its kind in Southern California. In addition to the books in its sprawling Glendale store it has a large stock warehoused offsite, totaling more than 100,000 books.

Opened in 1985, the store was slow to embrace the Internet, resisting the notion that book sales were increasingly moving online. Even now, only a fraction of its stock is listed via used book websites Abebooks and Alibris.

With its books sorted into more than 1,500 highly curated categories, Brand Bookshop has provided a terrific example of the power of browsing. Walking its aisles was an occasion for serendipity, contradiction and surprise.

When I highlighted the bookstore in 2011, I pointed out that when you were looking at Buddhism & Zen you might be leaning against Papacy & Vatican. Other categories that caught my eye were Classics, General Military Aviation, Star Trek, ESP, American West, California History, Northern California History, Gold Rush, Literary Biography, Sea Adventures, Art History, Theory & Criticism, Cinema: Biographies, and Shrubbery.

A master list of categories is behind the counter at the store, which is at 231 N. Brand Blvd. in Glendale. It is keeping regular business hours until it closes its doors for good.
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