Barnes & Noble has further slashed the prices of its NOOK tablet range, just weeks after announcing the company is departing from the tablet business. The latest round of price cuts are only relevant in the UK, however, and are promoted in celebration of the Reading Festival to encourage literacy in the UK.
The NOOK range starts at £99, which will fetch you the 7 inch Nook HD with 8 GB of storage. The same with 16 GB will now cost £129. Similarly, the bigger NOOK HD+ offering a 9 inch display will now cost £149, and £179 for the 16 and 32 GB versions of the tablet.
“To celebrate the free Get Reading festival and to help make digital reading more affordable across the UK, we have reduced prices on our award-winning NOOK HD and NOOK HD+ tablets for a limited time,” said Jim Hilt, Managing Director, Barnes & Noble in a company press release before also adding, “We are committed to promoting the cause of literacy and we hope that families from all over the UK come to the Get Reading festival on 13th of July for a fantastic day of events featuring some top authors and celebrities.”
The Get Reading campaign is the result of a partnership between London Evening Standard and NOOK to ensure readers get all the opportunities they need to get along with their reading. Towards this, B&N is also doling out a thousand of its NOOK Simple Touch e-Readers to the Beanstalk literacy charity. The latter in turn trains reading helpers who go to schools to help kids take up reading. The current offer is open only until the 13th July, which is when the Get Reading festival comes to an end, marked by a reading festival to be held at the Trafalgar Square in London.
However, while B&N’s commitment at promoting reading remains commendable, what also can be stated is that the company is using the above event as means to clear existing stocks. It’s a fire sale all right and reminds us of the $99 TouchPad. It remains to be seen if the NOOK tablet can match the TouchPad with the response they get.
With a keen interest in tech, I make it a point to keep myself updated on the latest developments in technology and gadgets. That includes smartphones or tablet devices but stretches to even AI and self-driven automobiles, the latter being my latest fad. Besides writing, I like watching videos, reading, listening to music, or experimenting with different recipes. The motion picture is another aspect that interests me a lot, and I'll likely make a film sometime in the future.
