Can bookshops survive in the era of Amazon?

At a midweek lunchtime in late June, a woman browsed the travel-writing shelves at Waterstones Piccadilly in central London. The shop, which claims to be Europe's largest bookstore, was otherwise quiet. James Daunt, Waterstones' managing director, gestured to the woman from the shop's café, where he was sipping a coffee opposite me. "We all know she is picking out a book that she can get from Amazon and it would save her a quid, or whatever it is," he said. "But as it pops through her letter box she will get only a fraction of the enjoyment that she would if she buys it here."

The curation of an inspiring browsing space is paramount to his business strategy. "A lot of it is visual - the attractiveness of books - and then it's how do you get the right titles, the right juxtaposition? How do you tease people? How do you amuse people? How do you get people into your shop, and how do you keep them there?" He nodded towards the woman again. "And in half an hour's time she'll probably still be there. Now, if we've done it well, she'll also walk out with something. Most importantly, she will have had a really nice time."