B&N announces NOOK expansion to UK in October

[Doug_Pardee Distinguished Bibliophile]

Barnes & Noble has announced that in mid-October they expect to be selling NOOKs and NOOK Books in the UK. Products will be offered through the nook.co.uk website and through retail partners to be named later.

[bklvr896]

Interesting. I was just over at eBay and they had the UK version listed and also an AU version which I assume means Australia.

[Strayer]

This is great. I hope that OZ and Canada are next. When Waterstones ( probably have the name wrong) went with Amazon, I was a bit dispirited.

[Doug_Pardee Distinguished Bibliophile]

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Strayer wrote:

I hope that OZ and Canada are next.

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Don't hold your breath on Canada. Unless Canada backs off on the Investment Canada Act that essentially blocks foreign bookstores from expanding into Canada, or the NOOK division gets spun off into a separate company that doesn't have physical stores, it's probably not going to happen.

[5ivedom]

Canada is workable.

Amazon agreed to invest in something strange like Arts & Cultures Department or something and got permission to open warehouses in Canada. Just last year.

Also, Nook division is getting spun off into a separate company (tentatively called 50 Shades of NewCo) with 17.6% ownership stake by Microsoft.

That's interesting. Perhaps one of the direct benefits of spinning off Nook would be that international expansion can happen quickly.

[Doug_Pardee Distinguished Bibliophile]

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5ivedom wrote:

Amazon agreed to invest in something strange like Arts & Cultures Department or something and got permission to open warehouses in Canada. Just last year.

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Amazon didn't have physical bookstores. There's a concern that if B&N is allowed to do business in Canada, they could open bookstores there, in competition with Canadian booksellers.

Also, Amazon sells all manner of goods. Books are a minority item for them. That was the basis on which Wal-Mart was permitted to open stores in Canada: they're not primarily a cultural-goods retailer.

[5ivedom]

Aah I see.

That makes things tough.