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Upper West Side Bookstore Shuts Door; Stands Accused of Fraud

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By: Marcus Tetrovsky

Perhaps the authorities will end up throwing the book at someone.

An Upper West Side bookstore has shut its doors because it stands accused of fraud. There is also a disagreement having to do with rent.

The nearly six-year-old Book Culture shop, with a branch located at Columbus Avenue and West 81st Street, closed for business earlier this month

The store reportedly notched annual sales of about $4 million two years ago. according to a report in the New York Daily News, that represented roughly a million dollars more than owner Chris Doeblin said was needed in order to remain in business. But around the middle of 2019, business reportedly began to tail off.

“The store was plagued by debt because of the increasing minimum wage and higher health insurance costs, according to Doeblin. The store shut down on Jan. 7, and he said in a letter to customers that it was $140,000 behind in rent,” therealdeal.com reported. “Minority owner John MacArthur blamed Doeblin for Book Culture’s problems, accusing him in a lawsuit of taking money from the Columbus Avenue store and giving it to three other Book Culture stores in Morningside Heights and Long Island City that were losing money.”

Another part of the lawsuit suggests that Doeblin started up a so-called community lending program that Doeblin says has raised $600,000 to keep the four Book Culture stores open. “MacArthur’s lawyers say the program does not follow regulations for crowdfunding, is not registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission and does not clarify that the Columbus Avenue Book Culture is owned separately from the other Book Culture stores,” realdeal.com added.

Book Culture was founded as Labyrinth Books in 1997 by current owner Chris Doeblin and his partner at the time Cliff Simms, the company explains on its web site. “In the summer of 2007, Book Culture became a completely independent company when Doeblin bought out his partners. Chris began his career in the early 1980s with a brief stint selling books for Papyrus book store at 114th and Broadway, and then as the receiving clerk in the basement of the old Book Forum which was located across from the main gate of Columbia on Broadway. In those days you could eat Chinese at Moon Palace or get egg creams and comic books at the Mill Luncheonette, people did not want to walk over to Columbus Ave. and nobody wanted to park on Riverside Drive.”

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