Saturday, February 16, 2019

National Bookstore Superbranch Cubao's Book Blowout

The four-storey National Bookstore in the heart of Araneta Center has always been one of my favorite places. I had so much memories from this bookstore. I visit the branch with my mother for our annual back to school shopping. In college, I relied on it for hard to find textbooks. I still remember how this branch was considered as the grandest bookstore in Manila. The ground floor was filled with the usual school and office supplies. The second floor housed the fiction reads. The third floor was devoted for text books, school references and those expensive coffee table books. It even has a coffee shop and library where anyone can grab and read a book. The last floor is my favorite. The entire floor was a home for all bargain books. As an additional treat, the glass panel windows provides a skyscrapping view of the Araneta Center. 

Today, the branch maintains only two floors. :( I cannot remember when the management downsized its operations. The school and office supplies remained on the ground floor and all books squeezed in the second floor. I still drop by the branch occasionally. I still love it, although admittedly, so much can be improved from its operations. I'll devote that in another post. ;) 



I think I said a lot. :D The real purpose of this post is to share my experience from an unexpected book sale. I wasn't aware that this branch is hosting a three-day book sale, not until I saw a sponsored Instagram post. The timing was perfect since it was Friday payday. My initial plan was as always, to look around. I arrived around 7 pm but soon enough, I needed a basket to carry my purchases. ;)

Here are photos from the Friday night sale 





The least chaotic section is from the Children's books. 


 Most racks for fiction reads ended this way, as early as Friday night 

Some of the popular and nice titles included on the sale 

There's a lot of Sophie Kinsella, Jojo Moyes, Kevin Kwan and Danielle Steel





Harry Potter in a different cover edition are all on sale. 


The small edition of John Green's books are so tempting to purchase. It retails at Php 549 without the discount yet. 

I stayed most of the time on the coffee table books section. 



But everything was so chaotic :D



I was so tempted!!!


And here's what I took home ;)  to my defense, two of the books were requested by friends 

The sale will run until tomorrow, Februrary 17, 2019.  The previous sales hosted by National Bookstore, like the Book Binge Bazaar, offers wider selections. However, I enjoyed and preferred this sale for three reasons. The venue was near to home, there are coffee table books and books sold do not look like factory rejects. Unlike those sold during their first Book Binge Bazaar, where each copy has unexplained black marks on the spine and fore-edge.

Overall, I love my short time and the relatively smaller venue of their book sale. The coffee table selections were the best for me. Copies are in good condition, even though everything was all scattered. I hope there will be another rerun on the last quarter this year. 

1 comment

  1. I've never been to this Superbranch until last Friday. I went there around 8PM :) I agree, the place was a mess! Hahaha. It was so hard to browse around. And I find the place a bit gloomy and sad. They really have to upgrade pretty pretty soon if they don't want to be left behind. Nowadays, I prefer to visit Fullybooked. I like their selections better now. Plus, their branches are always well lit and pleasing to the eyes.

    P.S. They extended the book sale until Feb 28! ♥ (I'll drop by again this week. Hahaha)

    ReplyDelete

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