Barnes and Noble

Barnes and Noble is the nation's largest book retailer with stores in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. The company went public in 1993 and had a two-for-one stock split in mid-1997. Although the company has enjoyed strong success in this highly competitive industry, it is not viewed favorably by all industry observers. Because of the volume in which Barnes and Noble can purchase, it has the ability to put smaller independent bookstores out of business when it moves into a particular market. It has also popularized buying books on the Internet, and recently settled a lawsuit brought by another Internet bookseller, Amazon.com. The history of Barnes and Noble and its recent financial performance illustrates how a company can participate in an industry which is essentially in the mature phase of the product lifecycle, and bring innovation which offers additional growth to that market. This research examines the industry's performance in recent years, the company's performance, the history of the company relating to its success, and the outlook for Barnes and Noble in the future.

The retail book market is not a high growth industry. In 1997, sales for the industry as a whole advanced only four percent to more than $20 billion. This advance was in keeping with the industry's performance during the 1990s as a whole, but is generally viewed as stable by industry analysts. This stability is attributed to the aging of the American publ

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n Bookseller, Doubleday Book Shops and Scribner's Bookstores. In addition Barnes and Noble is the world's largest supplier of books through direct-mail catalogs and it publishes books under its own imprint for exclusive sale through its retail bookstores and mail-order catalogs. The Company is also the exclusive bookseller in America Online's Marketplace, on Compuserve, and it recently launched a World Wide Web site, operating the "world's largest bookseller on-line." The company's primary business is the retail sale of books (both hardcover and paperbacks) appealing to the mass market. Key book segments carried by the retailer include mystery, romance, science fiction, popular fiction, children's books, off-price books and magazines. Barnes and Noble places a high value on the image that its stores present, and upgraded 12 of its older stores during 1996. Current plans call for an additional eight relocations or renovations during 1997. The costs associated with performing these upgrades are considered justified by the company because of the brand image protection that results and the additional time that consumers spend in the stores. The stores are designed to be similar to traditional libraries with wood fixtures, anti

Category: Business - B