Half Price Books will close in downtown Berkeley

Half Price Books in downtown Berkeley closed its doors for good on Nov. 30. Credit: Nico Savidge for Berkeleyside

Editors’ note: This story was first published on Berkeleyside on July 3.

Half Price Books, a fixture of downtown Berkeley for 20 years, will close its Shattuck Avenue location on Nov. 30, according to a spokesperson for the company.

“We have many great customers in that area for whom the Berkeley location is their closest store,” said Emily Bruce, Half Price Books’ public relations manager, in an email. “We wish we could stay but we have been unable to come to a lease agreement with our landlord.”

The building is owned by John Gordon, founder of Gordon Commercial Real Estate Services, and other family members.

Half Price Books at 2036 Shattuck Ave. will close near the end of the year. Credit: Nathan Dalton

Kevin Gordon, who runs Gordon Commercial Brokerage, said “we offered in many different ways to work with them on the current location as well as some other alternative locations in the downtown area.”

“We’re sorry to see them leave this location,” he said. “It’s been great having them there.”

Neither Bruce nor Gordon responded to questions about how much Half Price Books paid in rent and did not share further details about the lease negotiations.

The Berkeley store has 13 employees, who will be encouraged to apply to other Half Price Books locations and will be given a severance if they work through the closing date and leave the company, Bruce said. A manager reached by phone Wednesday said employees did not “have much information” regarding the closure and declined to comment further.

The 8,000-square-foot store is a bibliophile’s dream, with some 100,000 titles in a wide variety of genres. Beyond new and used books, the store also sells comics, records, magazines, DVDs, games and collectibles. It’s also a way for locals to make a quick buck by selling their used books and other items.

The closure comes on the heels of the closing of Books, Inc., which closed its Berkeley location in February after the 174-year-old company filed for bankruptcy. Other recent bookstore closures in the area include Barnes & Noble in El Cerrito, which closed in January, and Eastwind Books, which shuttered in 2023 after 41 years in business.

Shoppers on Thursday met the news with sadness.

“I am very upset,” said Roshni Singh, a grad student at UC Berkeley. “I moved here two years ago and since then, every month, once I get my salary, one of the first things I do is go to Half Price Books and pick up a stash for the month. I am hoping that because it’s a problem with the lease, they open another store in Berkeley.”

Another shopper, Samuel Lam, who works nearby, said he’ll miss the store, especially the endless browsing opportunities it offers.

“You just can’t browse the same way online,” he said.

Half Price Books is located in the The Kress Building, a Berkeley Landmark built in 1933 that once housed S. H. Kress & Co., a five-and-dime department store, whose name still adorns the building and the ground of the store’s entryway. Half Price Books moved into the building in 2005, after relocating from Solano Avenue.

The Kress Building also houses Aurora Theatre, which recently announced that it is suspending its 2025 season due to financial challenges, and the Jazzschool, whose California Jazz Conservatory degree program ended last year.

Half Price Books was founded in Dallas, Texas, in 1972 in a former laundromat, with the motto, “we buy and sell everything ever printed or recorded (except yesterday’s newspaper).” The store, which bills itself as “America’s largest family-owned retailer for new and used books,” currently has more than 120 locations in 19 states, according to its website, including Bay Area locations in Concord, Dublin and Fremont.

Half Price Books, 2036 Shattuck Ave., Berkeley. Phone: 510-526-6080. Hours: Monday-Thursday, 11 a.m.-8 p.m.; Friday-Sunday, 10 a.m.-10 p.m. Follow on Instagram and Facebook.

Half Price Books will close in downtown Berkeley

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