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Books Kinokuniya Company in Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan

Shinjuku Branch of Books Kinokuniya in Shinjuku, Tokyo, Japan

Books Kinokuniya (紀伊國屋書店, Kinokuniya Shoten^?) is a Japanese bookstore chain operated by Kinokuniya Company Ltd. (株式会社紀伊國屋書店, Kabushiki-gaisha Kinokuniya Shoten^?), founded in 1927, with its first store located in Shinjuku, Tokyo. It means "Store of Kii Province".

[edit] History

Kinokuniya was originally a lumber and charcoal dealer in Yotsuya; and after the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923, the business was moved westward to a new location in Shinjuku where it was re-fashioned into a book store.^[1]

[edit] The Store

In Japan today, there are 56 stores nationwide.

Since 2000, the Kinokuniya chain in the United States has capitalized on the growing popularity of anime by stocking both English and Japanese-language manga, as well as other anime-related paraphernalia. The New York City branch on 49th Street was the best-known, encompassing, lengthwise, an entire city block. A new store has opened south on 41st Street, and the old store is in the process of closing.

Books Kinokuniya is currently the largest bookstore in Australia and Singapore. It was once the largest bookstore in Indonesia as well as South East Asia, a record it held for nearly ten years thanks to the spacious Ngee Ann City branch in Singapore until the opening of the new Gramedia flagship store in Jakarta in 2007.

Fellow international bookstore chain Page One (headquartered in Singapore) began as the magazine agent for Kinokuniya but later became independent.