Barnes & Noble has reported Q3 2013 earnings for the fiscal three-month period ending January 31, with a loss of $0.18 per share on quarterly revenues of $2.2 billion. That’s down 8.8 percent from the same period last year, when B&N reported gains of $0.71 per share.

Net losses in Q3 totaled $6.1 million, a clear drop from net earnings of $52 million a year ago.

Analysts predicted revenues of $2.4 billion, and an EPS of $.54. Last quarter saw revenues of $1.9 billion and losses of $0.04 per share.

Q3 has been a messy one for the retailer, which started out as a college text book store. The holiday period, which is usually a sure spike for retailers, left Barnes & Noble with a 10.9 percent sales decrease on B&N retail and BN.com from the same time last year. B&N blames this on declining Nook hardware sales at its retail locations.

Reports are floating around that Barnes & Noble may spin out its Nook hardware business, or perhaps focus its OEM vision on partnerships with Microsoft.

Barnes & Noble denies the reports, but based on the widening losses compared to Barnes & Noble’s glory days, the question of a drastic change becomes not if, but when.

The Nook segment had revenues of $311 million during the nine-week period ending December 29, which was a 12.6 percent decrease from last year’s holiday Nook sales. All in all, Q3 saw a 26 percent YOY drop in Nook retail.

Barnes & Noble announced on January 28 that it would shutter nearly 1/3 of its retail stores, bringing its total from 689 to between 450 and 500 over the next decade.

Luckily, digital content sales rose 13.1 percent over that same nine-week holiday period, indicating that a departure from hardware and a focus on digital products could be the saving grace for the company.

The company also said on Valentines Day that it expected the Nook business to post an increased full-year loss, exceeding the $262 million loss seen in fiscal 2012. Though, B&N also expected losses to be less than $3 billion.

Categorised as: Chief Digital Officer | Digital Media | Feedster

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