Wow. Perhaps I'm over-reacting, but I think B&N is royally screwed.
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Originally Posted by SensualPoet
B&N has a lot of good stuff going for it -- retail presence, the college market, a billion dollar online business and a great brand name.
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Branding yes. Retail presence is a massive stone around their neck, as sales increasingly shift to online and ebooks. College bookstores may not be a good business for long, as a) textbooks start to go digital b) textbooks start to go open source and c) as the market reacts to major textbook pricing inflation.
And big online revenues don't matter much if you can't make a profit from them.
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Originally Posted by sensualpoet
I find it really hard t believe that a network of nearly 800 book-stores in the US can't find cost savings synergies beyond closing stores and firing staff.
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They've been squeezing efficiencies out of their business for years, there probably isn't much left to cut.
Not to mention that same-store sales apparently tanked, down over 4%, and likely more to come.
Maybe they will stick around, but I'm starting to think that B&N is roadkill.