Barnes & Noble does business -- big business -- by the book. As the #1 bookseller in the US, it operates about 650 superstores throughout 49 states and the District of Columbia under the banners Barnes & Noble, Bookstop, and Bookstar, as well as about 200 mall stores using the names B. Dalton, Doubleday, and Scribner's. The company's GameStop subsidiary is the #1 US video game retailer with about 1,500 stores under the names Babbage's Etc., GameStop, and FuncoLand. Barnes & Noble owned about 75% of online book seller barnesandnoble.com after purchasing Bertelsmann's interest in 2003; Barnes & Noble then purchased all remaining shares and took the company private in May 2004. Barnes & Noble dates back to 1873 when Charles Barnes went into the used-book business in Wheaton, Illinois. By the turn of the century, he was operating a thriving bookselling operation in Chicago. His son William took over as president in 1902. William sold his share in the firm in 1917, to C. W. Follett, who later built Follett Corp, and moved to New York City, where he bought an interest in established textbook wholesalers Noble & Noble. The company was soon renamed Barnes & Noble. It first sold mainly to colleges and libraries, providing textbooks and opening a large Fifth Avenue shop. Over the next three decades, Barnes & Noble became one of the leading booksellers in the New York region.
Freshman Leonard Riggio, who worked at a New York University bookstore to help pay for night school. He studied engineering but got the itch for bookselling. In 1965, at age 24, he borrowed $5,000 and opened Student Book Exchange NYC, a college bookstore. Beginning in the late 1960s, he expanded by buying other college bookstores.
In 1971 Riggio paid $1.2 million for the Barnes & Noble store on Fifth Avenue. He soon expanded the store, and in 1974 he began offering jaw-dropping, competitor-maddening discounts of up to 40% for best-sellers. Acquiring Marboro Books five years later, the company entered the mail-order and publishing business.
By 1986 Barnes & Noble had grown to about 180 outlets, which included 142 college bookstores. Along with Dutch retailer Vendex, that year it bought Dayton Hudson's B. Dalton mall bookstore chain, forming BDB
Holding Corp. In 1989 the company acquired the Scribner's Bookstores trade name and the Bookstop and Bookstar superstore chain. BDB began its shift to superstore format and streamlined its operations to integrate Bookstop and Doubleday (acquired in 1990) into its business.
BDB changed its name to Barnes & Noble in 1991. With superstore sales booming, the retailer went public in 1993 (the college stores remained private). It bought 20% of Canadian bookseller Chapters (now Indigo Books) in 1996 (then sold in 1999).
The bookseller went online in 1997, and in 1998 sold a 50% stake in its Web operation subsidiary to Bertelsmann (which it re-purchased in 2003) in an attempt to strengthen both companies in the battle against online rival Amazon.com.
Also in 1998 Barnes & Noble agreed to buy #1 US book distributor Ingram Book Group, but the deal was called off in 1999 because of antitrust concerns. Also in 1999 barnesandnoble.com went public and Barnes & Noble bought small book publisher J.B. Fairfax International USA, which included coffee-table book publisher Michael Friedman Publishing Group. Later that year the company bought a 49% stake in book publishing portal iUniverse.com (later reduced to 22%). It also bought Riggio's financially struggling Babbage's Etc., a chain of about 500 Babbage's, Software Etc., and GameStop stores, for $215 million.
The company's Babbage's Etc. subsidiary (renamed GameStop, Inc.) acquired video game retailer Funco for $161.5 million in 2000. In 2001 Barnes & Noble joined barnesandnoble.com in acquiring a majority stake in magazine subscription seller enews.com.
In February 2002 the company completed an initial public offering of its GameStop unit, reducing its ownership interest to about 63%. The same month Leonard handed over the CEO title to his brother, Steve Riggio. In July, it was announced that enews.com would be shut down due to repeated quarterly losses. In December Barnes & Noble beefed up its self-publishing efforts with its purchase of publishing house Sterling Publishing, a specialist in how-to and craft books. Not the most comfortable of bedfellows to begin with, further aggravated mainstream publishers' concerns when it purchased leading how-to publisher Sterling Publishing in 2002. Barnes & Noble expects its publishing business to grow to 10% of its revenues before 2010.
Barnes & Noble stores are typically 10,000 to 60,000 sq. ft. and stock between 60,000 to 200,000 book titles. Many locations contain Starbucks cafes, as well as music departments carrying over 50,000 music titles. Barnes & Noble plans to open about 35 additional book stores and some 330 video game stores by the end of this year.
Barnes & Noble has a 22% stake in publishing portal iUniverse and a 74% share of Calendar Club. Chairman Leonard Riggio controls about 20% of the company, including all of the voting power of Barnes & Noble College Bookstores, a private textbook seller.
The company is spinning off its GameStop subsidiary. In early October GameStop purchased some six million shares back from Barnes & Noble. On November 2 Barnes & Noble distributed the remaining shares it had in GameStop in a dividend to its shareholders.
Business Wire, November 3, 2004 Wednesday, 1:30 PM GMT, 748 words, Barnes & Noble to Open New Store at 30500 State Highway 181, Spanish Fort, Alabama; New Bookstore Debuts on No Copyright 2004 Business Wire, Inc. Business Wire
November 3, 2004 Wednesday 1:30 PM GMTDISTRIBUTION: Business Editors; Community Editors LENGTH: 748 words HEADLINE: Barnes & Noble to Open New Store at 30500 State Highway 181, Spanish Fort, Alabama; New Bookstore Debuts on November 17 DATELINE: NEW YORK Nov. 3, 2004 BODY:vember 17 , NEW YORK Nov. 3, 2004
2. Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company
The New York Times
September 9, 2004 Thursday
Late Edition – Final SECTION: Section E; Column 1; The Arts/Cultural Desk; Pg. 1 LENGTH: 931 words HEADLINE: Huge Book Retailer Expands Its Publishing Role BYLINE: By EDWARD WYATT