In sharp contrast to the days when corporate employees took pride in their company’s growth, seeing it as the result of a successful group effort, many clerks have come to see themselves as being in direct competition with their employers’ expansion dreams. “If Borders opened thirty-eight new stores a year instead of forty,” reasoned Jason Chappell, sitting next to Brenda Hilbrich on the vinyl seats of our deli booth, “they could afford to give us a nice wage increase. On average it costs $7 million to open a superstore. That’s Borders’ own figures….”

“But,” Brenda interrupted, “if you say that directly to them, they say, ‘Well, that’s two markets we don’t get into.’”

“We have to saturate markets,” Chappell said, nodding.

“Yeah,” Brenda added. “We have to compete with Barnes & Noble.”

The retail clerks employed by the superchains are only too familiar with the manic logic of expansion.