Barnes & Noble, the largest retail bookseller in the United States, reported a first quarter loss widening to $34.9 million. Amid the continuing slump in sales, the company appointed Ronald Boire as the new chief executive officer, and analysts saw it as a sign that they will continue to experiment selling toys and electronics.
Barnes & Noble's quarterly sales went down by 1.5 percent to $1.22 billion. The loss per share amounted to 68 cents, which is short of 12 cents from the estimated per-share profit of the analysts, America's Market reported.
The revenue of the retail business went down by 1.7% to $939 million. Meanwhile, Nook's sales reportedly dropped by 22.4% to $54 million, with digital content sales falling by 28% to $37 million and devices and accessories sales dropping by 6.2% to $17 million.
It was reported that the company teamed up with Samsung to produce Nook devices. During the analysts' call, the company said that the "rationalization of Nook expenses" is on their top priority.
In July, the Barnes & Noble made an announcement of hiring Boire, a retail veteran. He used to work for Brookstone, Toys "R" Us and Best Buy.
Boire saw toys, games and other goods as an essential part of a business as their sales reportedly increased 17.5 percent in the first quarter fiscal. The New York Times learned that his goal was to transform the stores, making it an even more fascinating stop and community hub.
"We're thinking a lot about what the Barnes & Noble of the future might look like," the new chief executive said. "We need to be where our customers want us to be, digitally and physically."
In addition, Boire is reportedly considering new store prototypes. The new chief didn't offer additional details, but the store's hallow spaces reportedly suggest that the only logical thing to do is to downsize, according to the New York Post.
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