Staples

Liberty Media's sell-off of its stake in Barnes & Noble last month might have seemed like one more nail in the bookseller's coffin.  The company has been struggling for years and most recently reporting a year-over-year revenue decrease of 10% in Q3 of 2013. B&N's Nook division had been considered its one bright spot and led to Liberty's interest in the company in the first place.  But when competing with Amazon proved to be too difficult, Liberty bailed and the news of its divestiture sent B&N's share price down by 10%.

Sometimes living in Maine has unexpected advantages beyond lobster, seaside air, and friendly people, as I discovered yesterday when learning one of the newest beta sites for the Espresso Print-on-Demand system was being unveiled at a South Portland Books-a-Million store. Publerati is located in nearby Portland.

After tentative first steps, e-commerce giant Amazon is going on the offensive in Canada’s burgeoning e-reader market, finally debuting its Kindle north of the border in a direct challenge to the country’s top-selling Kobo.

But e-bookworms shouldn’t expect the same prices or selection granted to Kindle users in the U.S.

“It’s the big entry,” said Amazon’s vice-president of Kindle Peter Larsen, who flew to Toronto from Seattle to make the announcement.

Amazon has another (pretty much) informationless press release out about Kindle sales this morning.

The closest thing we get to real data: Worldwide Kindle sales over the holiday shopping weekend were more than double last year's sales.

Awesome! Right?

Well, we have no clue because Amazon has never revealed absolute Kindle sales numbers. For all we know, Amazon sold 10,000 Kindle tablets and e-readers over the weekend.

Jon Cog of the Me and My Kindle blog gave us a very convenient heads-up yesterday about Amazon’s Black Friday plans for the Kindle Fire. As he reports on his site:

Amazon’s retail-store partners, like Best Buy, OfficeMax, Staples, or Office Depot, [are] reportedly not allowed to lower the actual price of the [Kindle Fire], but they’re doing the next best thing. If you purchase a Kindle Fire tablet, they’ll just give you some money back in the form of a gift card!

Kobo, a global leader in eReading, today unveiled its new Kobo Family of eReading devices:  the Kobo Glo, Kobo Mini, Kobo Touch and the Kobo Arc – a 7” Android tablet. Designed by booklovers for booklovers, the new Kobo Family starts at $79.99 and provides readers with more choice and more ways to personalize their eReading experience than ever before – including new stylish colors, accessories, lighting and multimedia options. 

Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS), the leading retailer of content, digital media and educational products, today announced that its award-winning NOOK reading experience and leading digital bookstore are coming to the United Kingdom this autumn through a new www.nook.co.uk online storefront, marking the first time the company will expand its business internationally. The world’s largest bookseller will also offer its highly sought-after NOOK digital products and content to UK reading and entertainment lovers through partnerships with leading retailers expected to be announced shortly. These well-known UK partners are expected to support the NOOK offering there through both established physical and online channels.

NEW YORK, NY – August 6, 2012 – Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS), the leading retailer of content, digital media and educational products, today announced new NOOK Tablet customers will receive an instant free collection of exciting and beloved Disney eBooks as part of our NOOK Kids Summer Reading Program (www.nook.com/kids-summer-reading). This collection features a variety of NOOK Kids picture books along with interactive Read and Play™ and Read To Me™ titles featuring favorite Disney characters, perfect for families to read together. This limited time offer applies to new in-store purchases of both NOOK Tablet 16GB ($249) and NOOK Tablet 8GB ($199) at any of Barnes & Noble’s nearly 700 stores nationwide.  This is the third collection of eBooks offered through the NOOK Kids Summer Reading Program, specially designed to keep children engaged in reading all summer long.

New York, New York – July 30, 2012 – Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS), the leading retailer of content, digital media and educational products, today announced that Red-Headed Stepchild from Jaye Wells’ Sabina Kane series, will be featured as the latest pick for “Barnes & Noble Spotlight” (www.bn.com/spotlight), a NOOK Book™ program that features great writers at irresistible prices. Twice a month, Barnes & Noble Spotlight picks an author of a popular or breakout series from various genres and offers one of their titles at a special price, helping NOOK® readers discover new authors and dive into an exciting series for a wallet-friendly price. From July 28 through August 10, Barnes & Noble’s NOOK Bookstore will offer Red-Headed Stepchild for only 99 cents.

Barnes & Noble, the leading retailer of content, digital media and educational products, and FastPencil, today announced a merchandising partnership that provides FastPencil’s authors with unique access to merchandising programs on NOOK® devices, NOOK reading apps, on BN.com and in Barnes & Noble stores. Founded by Michael Ashley and Steve Wilson, FastPencil offers authors a wide range of publishing services through their proprietary authoring platform as well as two publishing imprints: PREMIERE and Wavecrest.