Yesterday Barnes and Noble released their 2014 first quarter financial results, and the news was pretty bad. Revenues are continually going down, and the Nook division is still sinking faster than B&N’s retail division.
The retail segment had revenues of 1 billion dollars, which is down nearly 10% from the prior year. The Nook segment, which includes Nook devices, digital content, and accessories, reported revenues of $153 million, for a total decrease of 20.2% from one year ago (and it’s not like the Nook was doing so great then).
This may sound like dire news for the Nook, but Barnes and Noble continues to remain devoted to the Nook brand.
In fact the press release confirms that at least one new Nook is in the works, and it will be released by the holiday shopping season. It could even be another tablet. B&N backtracked on earlier comments where they said that they would outsource future Nook Tablets:
“The company intends to continue to design and develop cutting-edge NOOK black and white and color devices. We will continue to offer our award-winning line of NOOK products including NOOK Simple Touch, NOOK Simple Touch with Glow Light, NOOK HD and NOOK HD+ at the best values in the marketplace. At least one new NOOK device will be released for the coming holiday season and further products are in development,” said Michael P. Huseby, the new President of Barnes & Noble, and Chief Executive Officer of Nook Media.
Reading closer into that statement, perhaps Mr. Huseby is referring to color ebook readers and not tablets. Everyone is assuming that the statement of “color” devices refers to tablets. But B&N never actually uses the word tablet anywhere in any of their reports or quotes yesterday, as a commenter pointed out. Perhaps B&N has plans to release a color ebook reader instead. If they could pull it off, that could be one way to help revitalize the Nook brand. But that’s a big “if”.
My favorite reader is the Nook Glowlight. I have it rooted, nothing comes close to Cool Reader with his little fat fonts that I like to use and Fora Dictionary and all of his languages. Try that on other tablet you will not be able.
I read fast like a madman, so the fat little fonts which fill the whole screen, no margin included are perfect.
The fastest human readers can read fast because they barely move their eyes.
Also I can view Chinese E-Books (I do not read them because I can not read Chinese, but I had a Chinese colleague who was very happy to see that is possible.)
I have the other Apps installed like Amazon Kindle, Aldiko and Kobo-s shop, but I do not use them, if I buy book from them I de-DRM it and load it in via Calibre.
It is an old reader, but for me is still the best on the market.
No other reader can come close what Cool Reader and Fora can do.
Currently I am thinking about an A4 PDF reader, Jetbook Color 2 and not yet on the market Sony Mobious are on my mind, well we shall see. 🙂
I am skeptical about a new color eInk reader from, B&N but if they get a higher resolution one which can be root it, that will be fine too!
I still think they will release a new e-ink reader. They apparently have a high volume of HD readers still on hand so I don’t think they will be releasing anything along those lines anytime soon. I would like them to release something similar to the Kobo Aura HD. That would be a huge improvement for their e-ink line.
Didn’t you say earlier this month that E Ink was expected to release a new screen by the end of the year?
Yep.
It would be nice to see somebody release an eInk reader with some “tablet” features built in. Like being able to check your email and read RSS feeds. I think an eInk reader with an email and RSS client built into the stock functionality would be a game changer more than color eInk, at least at the 6″ size. (Are you listening B&N?)
As I recall, NOOK Media is particularly strong in e-magazine subscriptions. Those really need color, and benefit quite a bit from larger screen sizes (the HD+, currently).
I’m guessing that’s why NOOK Media is backing away from Lynch’s plan to get out of color devices. I’m also guessing that “color” will continue to mean “backlit LCD,” not E-Ink. I haven’t yet seen a reflective color screen technology that will render magazine images (and adverts) anywhere near as vibrantly as LCD does.
“Yesterday Barnes and Noble released their 2014 first quarter financial results”
Hey Nathan shouldn’t that be 2013 results?
Nope. 2014 is right. It’s a weird world we live in…