Their flagship store, dubbed Powell's City of Books, claims to be the largest independent new and used bookstore in the world.

His son, Michael Powell, had started a bookstore in Chicago, Illinois, in 1970 which specialized in used, rare, and discounted books, primarily of an academic and scholarly nature.

The new branch was not a replica of its City of Books location; Powell was concerned that the "edgy" neighborhood of its headquarters location was limiting its customer base, so the new store was "fairly fancy" with white shelving, a tile floor, and banners over the aisles.

[10] Powell's established its Internet presence in 1993, beginning with email and FTP-based access to its technical bookstore; it has since expanded to incorporate fiction and other genres as a traditional ecommerce site.

[13] In January 2008, Powell's announced plans to expand the downtown City of Books by adding as many as two floors to the store's southeast corner.

[14][15][16] Plans submitted to the Portland Design Commission in November 2008 called for a rooftop garden atop the new addition and an "art cube" over a redesigned main entrance.

[17] In March 2010, Michael Powell confirmed plans to hand over management of the business to his daughter Emily as of July.

[1] That same month, Powell's announced it would close its technical bookstore on the North Park Blocks, moving its sections on math, science, computing, engineering, construction, and transportation into "Powell's Books Building 2" at the corner of 10th and Couch Street, near the main City of Books location.

[33] In September 1999, ILWU Local 5 met for the first time with Powell's management, to begin the contract bargaining process.

After some early successes, 2000 saw a slowdown in the discussions, followed by rallies, filings of unfair labor practices, an unsuccessful decertification campaign, a one-day shutdown of the shipping department (accompanied by the slashing of a van's tire), and federal mediation.

[33] In February 2011, Powell's announced the layoffs of 31 employees, over 7% of its unionized workforce, in “response to the unprecedented, rapidly changing nature of the book industry."

A union representative said that Powell's had reduced its workforce by about 40 in the prior year through attrition, but felt that layoffs were still necessary because of a decline in sales of new books and a rise in health care costs.

[35] CEO Emily Powell did not provide the precise number of layoffs in the letter she released on March 17, 2020.

[37][38] In July 2020, Powell's announced that the store and kiosk in the Portland International Airport would remain closed permanently.