Building on our report from Friday, Barnes & Noble has indeed announced a press event on the morning of November 7 featuring “a very special announcement,” widely expected to unveil their latest ereading tablet. Separately, at the company’s annual meeting last week, the company confirmed the other piece of information cited from the Digital Reader: the company is doubling the size of the Nook boutiques in 40 of their “most productive stores” to 2,000 square feet of space, presumably to feature those new devices.
Riverrun Bookstore will not renew the lease at its current location in Portsmouth, NH, set to expire at the end of December, and may close then unless it can find a new, less expense location and additional backing. Owner Tom Holbrook said in an email to customers that after five years, “the rise of digital books, the poor economy, and some very large debts have left the store in a terrible position. We’ve hung on by our fingernails for the last two years hoping things would improve, but they haven’t.”
Holbrook traced the store’s financial difficulties to a large loan he took out in 2007 to buy out his original two partners, and he is “now more than willing to take on new partners, if there is anyone out there foolish enough to be interested.” With the store set to shorten hours and require pre-payment on special orders, Holbrook said the city “deserves a first rate bookstore, and RiverRun hasn’t been that for a couple years. It’s time for us to fix the problems and launch into a brave new world of bookselling, or it’s time for us to get out of the way and let somebody else take a shot at it.”