Roundtable – Dual Screen e-readers, B&N and Walmart Kobo e-Readers

February 19, 2018 By Michael Kozlowski 3 Comments

Welcome to another exciting edition of the Good e-Reader Roundtable with Michael and Peter. Today on the show the two fellows talk about the recent firings Barnes and Noble made last week, where 1,800 people were let go. Walmart and Kobo struck a deal where audiobooks and ebooks would be sold on the Walmart website and Kobo e-readers would be available in all US stores. Dual screen e-readers have been around for awhile, but were very niche products. Lately, a number of companies have got involved in the space, will there be a resurgence?

Michael Kozlowski

Michael Kozlowski is the Editor in Chief of Good e-Reader. He has been writing about audiobooks and e-readers for the past ten years. His articles have been picked up by major and local news sources and websites such as the CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and Verge.

John Smith

Why would *anyone* go to a physical store to buy an e-book? For that matter, why would anyone go to Walmart on-line to buy an ebook? No, ebooks are a non-starter at Walmart.

Kobo at Walmart? Walmart relies upon volume. Lots and lots of volume and products like ereaders need *massive* push advertising to succeed there. A) The category isn’t large enough to justify large push advertising budgets and, even were it, B) Kobo’s not the company to do it: Lots of good engineers, not lots of good marketers.

Best Buy, Indigo US, even B&N would all be better alternatives than Walmart. That’s because those are all places which don’t need push advertising and folks in those stores who weren’t looking for an ereader MIGHT stumble across the device.
Good E-Reader

Well Indigo and Best Buy in Canada sell Kobos.
Heidi Steindel

Sadly Best Buy in the USA only sells Kindles but I agree Best Buy is a better place to sell it.