The Barnes and Noble entire product line of e-readers which includes the new Simple Touch and the ever popular Nook Color continue to garner the company strong revenue. Overall sales in the last quarter rose a staggering 140% and made the company $277 million dollars. B&N forecast that by years end they would have made $1.8 billion dollars.
Barnes and Noble continues to make money while rival bookstore chain Borders faded away in obscurity. This is mainly arbitrated to the fact that B&N sold their own ebooks and e-readers. In the last quarter device sales accounted for over %20 of the companies overall profit margins. While Borders stores have all but closed and went out of business, B&N continues to open more university and college stores and now has over 635 that focus on textbooks.
Chief Executive William Lynch told analysts on a conference call that the bookseller has 26 percent to 27 percent of the e-book market, the same market share he claimed last quarter.
Barnes and Noble is projected to have a stellar holiday season starting with Black Friday in the USA and culminating with the Christmas season in later December. Many customers will be switching to the company since Borders is a non-factor now and e-readers become even more visible in popular culture. There are many commercials now for the Nook line of e-reader and many people are becoming more aware of the technology. B&N has not divulged sales figures that it has spent in advertising but their campaign seems to be working.
Currently B&N is the second most prolific company in the USA selling e-readers, behind Amazon. This holiday season the bookstore chain will have their work cut out for them as Amazon is planning on launching a new tablet computer and a new color Kindle e-Reader.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
