Happy New Year

by Alan Beatts

Happy New Year, everyone. I'm lucky enough that the first part of this column hasn't changed much in the past seven years. 2005 was a good year for Borderlands, the staff and me personally. Everyone is healthy and happy. Business has been strong and our sales are up once again. We've made a few changes around the shop (though, regrettably a number of the suggestions that you made last year have yet to be put into place -- believe me, I'm not ignoring them, I'm just slow). One of the most recent changes has been a big reorganization of the shelves at the back of the store. Everything is still pretty much in the same place, but the shelves have been rearranged. Everyone seems to think that it looks much nicer plus the new arrangement leaves more room for browsing and our book club meetings.

As always, none of the good things that happened last year would have been possible without two groups of wonderful people. First, my staff -- Jude, Jeremy, Claud, Cary, Francis, and Heather together make up the best staff that any business owner could ask for and more than that, they are the finest group of people I've ever had the pleasure to know. Why they put up with me will be forever a mystery.