The George-Anne has confirmed that the University Store is officially closing before the end of the semester and transitioning to a Barnes & Noble on both the Statesboro and Armstrong campuses.

Plans to lease the University Store to Barnes & Noble were confirmed by Associate Vice President for Auxiliary Services Jeff Blythe, during a public Staff Council meeting on Friday, Feb. 21. 

“We are transitioning our bookstore from a self-operated model to a contracted model with Barnes and Noble, they will be taking over the operations of the store,” said Blythe. 

The bookstore will be transitioning from University Store staff to Barnes & Noble staff between April 7 and April 11, and reopening on April 14, according to Blythe. 

According to Blythe, students can access scantrons and bluebooks at Gus Marts during the week the bookstore is closed.

“We will make sure students have scantrons for that week,” Blythe said. 

Employees’ Fate

Current University Store student and full-time employees will have to apply through Barnes & Noble to continue working at the bookstore. 

“Currently the ads are posted. So anybody that’s currently working for Georgia Southern can apply, including students to work for Barnes and Noble,” said Blythe. 

At the time of publication, the positions that are posted through the Barnes & Noble College employment portal include:

• Campus Retail Associate (seasonal) 
• Campus Retail Associate (temporary) 
• Supervisor (part-time)
• Campus Retail Associate- Textbooks (part-time)
• Campus Retail Associate- Techshop Support (part-time)
• Campus Retail Associate- General Merchandise (part-time)
• Campus Retail Associate – Shipping and Receiving (part-time)
• Six full-time positions – Associate Manager, Department Manager, and General Manager. 

In our previous article, University Store student employees were informed by staff that they were “invited” to reapply if they qualify under the conditions for Work Study positions. 

We spoke to a bookstore employee who wishes to remain anonymous. They told us, “Either it was changed or Jeff was misinformed when he originally told us it was work study.” 

GSU Merch Sale

The University Store confirmed the transition via a message on their website. All gift cards must be used by April 4. According to the store’s website and social media, there will be Exclusive weekly sales. Currently, all winter clothing, hoodies, hats, gloves, etc, are 50% off. 

We reached out to Engagement & Communications Strategist April Burke to schedule a meeting with the Vice President for Business and Finance Ron Stalnaker and a Barnes & Noble campus representative to get further information on this transition by the end of this week. We will continue to follow this story and stay up-to-date on our website.