‘Too Soon to See Any Impact’ From Amazon Brick-and-Mortar Stores, BN CEO Says

It’s “too soon to see any impact” on Barnes & Noble’s New York stores from the two Amazon brick-and-mortar stores that opened recently in Manhattan, said Barnes & Noble CEO Demos Parneros on a Thursday earnings call. “It’s a different kind of bookstore,” Parneros said of the two Manhattan Amazon locations, one that opened in Columbus Circle in May, the other on 34th Street in the past two weeks. “Our stores are really much more about discovery and spending time walking through stores, examining different categories,” he said. “I think their stores are much smaller and they have a different purpose.” Barnes & Noble will “focus on reinventing our new type of prototype store,” which will be bigger than Amazon’s, but smaller than the “existing average” Barnes & Noble store, he said.