B&N buys out Microsoft's Nook stake

[DBDigital]

I also liked the aspect about read-in-store and when the nook first came out (for a couple of years anyway) they had some great promotions in the cafe. Free chocolate and a few other items. The cupons showed up in the store section of the Nook and you showed that to the cashier. Which was rather cool. But they stopped that about when Nook Color came or a little after. A real shame. The idea of being able to sample books while being in the cafe is great and a benefit to them as you can't damage the physical books by say a food accident.

By the way, the information about the partitioning is inaccurate. They changed that with a update to the Nook NT and the tablets (Nook HD) after you weren't limited to just 1gig user space. Of course as also mentioned that wasn't the only option, just get a SD card. Which is what I did. I could have got them to change the partitioning , but decided against it since it would likely killed all of my data. I have since rooted the unit and could repartition, but again just didn't bother. With the SD card it just wasn't worth it to make the change.

Oh other features I thought were nice, the free articles and sometimes books when you go into the store with your nook. They say it is still in use but I can't find it on my Nook last time I was in a store. I think they moved it to another section or the store here removed it from their system. Anyone here still able to access that?

[Barty]

Sad to see companies seeming to just give up. I don't even know what the heck b&n is thinking any more. It's like they're just waiting for the end to come.

I'm rather fond of my hd+. To be fair, I only bought it used and after b&n had started selling them for cheap. I guess that was the problem.

[DreamWriter]

Originally Posted by Barty

Sad to see companies seeming to just give up. I don't even know what the heck b&n is thinking any more. It's like they're just waiting for the end to come.

It sure does seem that way.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by Barty

I'm rather fond of my hd+. To be fair, I only bought it used and after b&n had started selling them for cheap. I guess that was the problem.

The main problem with their tablets was that they didn't have much to sell for them. They had (have?) an anemic app and video store and they blocked those who wouldn't root their tablets from the Play Store. So the things (for non-hackers) were about useless. (And they found that the people who read and bought a lot of books, normally used E-Ink eReaders.) Then they opened up the Play Store so folks could buy their subsidized hardware and purchase other people's content (which they were doing anyhow, after rooting the devices). They either didn't have the will or the money to build a marketplace like Amazon had done -- so tablets were kind of a dead end for them.

[NickyWithNook]

That's something I always liked about my Nook ST. I liked knowing that I could carry every book I might possibly want to read with me so that if I wanted to quickly reference something, or if it occurred to me to read something I hadn't thought of, it would be there. No planning before a trip of what books I want on my e-reader. They're always all there anyway.

OTOH I never actually found it useful for me, personally. I'm glad they exist as I'm sure it's useful for some people. I found that I started adding books I'd never read and just had clutter. I decided to delete a lot of stuff off one of my Nooks anyway because I didn't want to file through it. But I'm fairly disorganized. It would probably work better for someone else.

I don't have very many books on my Kindle Paperwhite. And I'm using the Kindle Fire a lot and much of what I read is on various clouds - I didn't think I'd like reading on a tablet, but so far it seems OK, and I like having B&N, Amazon, and Scribd stuff all available. I still have a Nook with tons of stuff loaded (my husband's) but I like the lit e-readers better and neither my Paperwhite nor my Glowlight take SD cards.

[peachiekene]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Mostly I just want to see the anything-but-amazon crowd face a market divided between Amazon and Wal-Mart. Apoplexies galore.

[pl001]

I haven't used my original Nook in almost 3 years, not since I got my first EVO phone. I stopped using Nook apps early this year. They still have a competitive store but it isn't as good as Kindle, so there's little reason for me to keep shopping there.

It is kind of sad, as the original Nook was innovative and good quality and I became a much more avid reader once I got it.

[soondai]

Everyone always busts B&N's chops for all their "blunders."

I think they are in an untenable position. They cannot match Amazon's prices in physical stores in the end. Sure it's fun to browse and graze, but as they trim away all the stuff that doesn't move quickly, it isn't much different that scrolling down the Amazon best seller list anyway. Definitely not an experience that makes it worth paying all the extra loot.

Everyone has a lot of great sounding ideas on what they should do. Mine is that they should negotiate free rent, hire Chinese leprechauns to man the registers, and adopt a free foot massage Thursday policy.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by soondai

Everyone always busts B&N's chops for all their "blunders."

I think they are in an untenable position.

They are.
The thing is, hindsight being 20-20, it is easy to see exactly where they went wrong. And in both realms they had all the pieces to succeed and at every single junction they did exactly the wrong thing, in the face of evidence favoring the opposite move. This isn't the case of being blindsided by a bolt out of the blue: they had all the data before them and either read it wrong or chose to ignore it.

Simple test: when Amazon bought Mobipocket, it was public knowledge.
When Amazon set up Lab126, it was public knowledge.
Put the two together and it was obvious what they were up to.
Worse, Kindle rumors started months ahead of the actual release and then Amazon screwed up the launch and had no product to sell for six months. Yet, after all that, it took them two years to answer the Kindle.
Similar misteps on the pbook side continue to today, where they *still* have a substandard online operation twenty years after Amazon launched and well over a year after announcing a relaunch for *last* spring.

Their position is untenable because they made it untenable.

Here, check this. It is surprisingly relevant.

http://theness.com/neurologicablog/i...unning-kruger/

It made me think of Cheers' Cliff Clavern.

[pl001]

Originally Posted by soondai

Everyone always busts B&N's chops for all their "blunders."

I think they are in an untenable position. They cannot match Amazon's prices in physical stores in the end. Sure it's fun to browse and graze, but as they trim away all the stuff that doesn't move quickly, it isn't much different that scrolling down the Amazon best seller list anyway.

That can be said of just about every Brick and Mortar business when it comes to competing with Amazon.

I think B&N has adapted OK in their B&M stores. I enjoy taking my kids there. They expanded too large with too many stores. But that business appears to be recovering.

What Microsoft was trying to do is anybody's guess. It's like they bought in and then immediately lost interest. I thought they would integrate Nook into their ecosystem but that never happened.

[taustin]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

They are.

Here, check this. It is surprisingly relevant.

http://theness.com/neurologicablog/i...unning-kruger/

This ("The Innovator's Dilemma") is rather more relevant. The difficulties that long established companies have in dealing with disruptive technology is pretty well documented.

I agree with soondai that B&N never really had a chance. Their only real mistake was to not be Amazon in the first place.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by taustin

This ("The Innovator's Dilemma") is rather more relevant. The difficulties that long established companies have in dealing with disruptive technology is pretty well documented.

I agree with soondai that B&N never really had a chance. Their only real mistake was to not be Amazon in the first place.

The bestselling classic on disruptive innovation, by renowned author Clayton M. Christensen.

His work is cited by the world’s best-known thought leaders, from Steve Jobs to Malcolm Gladwell. In this classic bestseller—one of the most influential business books of all time—innovation expert Clayton Christensen shows how even the most outstanding companies can do everything right—yet still lose market leadership.

Christensen explains why most companies miss out on new waves of innovation. No matter the industry, he says, a successful company with established products will get pushed aside unless managers know how and when to abandon traditional business practices.

That last paragraph seems to imply that B&N had a chance, and lost it.

Perhaps you are both right?

[soondai]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Similar misteps on the pbook side continue to today, where they *still* have a substandard online operation twenty years after Amazon launched and well over a year after announcing a relaunch for *last* spring.

Their position is untenable because they made it untenable.

I honestly still can't picture how they can match Amazon on the pbook side. They have to pay rent and pay cashiers. They cannot do so and win a price war with Amazon's warehouses.

They can match the online price with their own site, which they often do, but then you end up with the weird situation of B&N selling the same book for 2 very different prices, one online, one in store, as they currently do. Or splitting the difference with a consistent price.

I just don't see how the big bookstore can make it. And for all the talk about the resurgence of indies, I wish I'd actually get so see it in person some day instead of just reading about it.

[conan50]

B&N strength is not, and never will be price competitiveness with Amazon in their brick and mortar stores. Their selling point should be that you can go and touch and see actual print books, hold them in your hand, and have a decent selection to choose from, and enjoy a cup of coffee at the same time.
To me B&N stores look like something out of Frankenstein today, a weird mix of toys, CDs, and DVDs, among other things. If you look hard and are willing to go up a flight of stairs you can actually find books.
Considering that DVDs and CDs are also a dying medium I can't say I see much future for their physical stores at this rate either.
They should go back to what they did well, sell the experience, and have tons of books. Forget about even pretending they can match Amazon or Walmart on prices.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by soondai

I honestly still can't picture how they can match Amazon on the pbook side.

Easy. Build a good web site and give their customers a good shopping experience.
You don't have to match Amazon prices every minute of every day on every title. It's not all about price. (Notice all the futile griping about Prime pricing?)

Before the conspiracy put them out of business, plenty of much smaller ebookstores used creative retail techniques to hold their own against Amazon.

Amazon is no invincible juggernaut. You can compete with them if you are smart enough.

B&N has in fact done okay in protecting their B&M bookstores. But that is precisely their problem: they sacrificed a good chunk of their future to protect a small part of their present. Not onlike Kodak, who invented digital photography but marginalized it to protect film and ended up with neither.

Don't forget B&N was investing in ebook readers in the last century and ebooks early in this one. They *knew* ebooks were coming.

Their problem has been execution. Competence in pbook B&M not translating online and their continual copying of others without understanding why Sony, Amazon, and Apple did what they did and why it was bad to imitate them if they couldn't follow through.

As to the big stores, remember B&N bought out entire chains of small, efficient bookstores... to close them. They chose to make customers go to them instead of going to them. Even now, they still could adapt by going small--Best Buy is doing it. It's not too late for them. But they're not even trying.

They simply bet on the wrong business model. Over and over, even after it was clear it was a losing bet.