Barnes & Noble Is Opening 31 New Stores—And Making 1 Other Huge Change
Thank BookTok, the COVID pandemic, or good marketing tactics, but more than 1 billion new books are sold each year in the U.S., more than the roughly 825 million movie tickets sold in the U.S. and Canada, as Slate reported. Even more notable is that about 85 percent of these book sales are for physical books (read: not e-books). So, we can’t say we’re surprised that America’s biggest bookseller, Barnes & Noble, is continuing to open stores across the country.
RELATED: Bed Bath & Beyond Is Opening 300 New Stores—5 Things We Know So Far.
Barnes & Noble’s business has been on the upswing since 2021.
As Best Life reported back in January, Barnes & Noble CEO James Daunt did an interview with NPR, during which he said the key to his company’s success was reinstating a neighborhood bookstore feel.
“The key insight that I have is that it is about the bookselling team and it’s about how you take all of this huge number of books and arrange them and display them in a manner which really engages with your local community,” he explained. “Leave it to the teams in each store. The vast majority of them will do it exceptionally well, and your stores will become better and busier and the business will thrive.”
On the flipside, he said Amazon sells “boring books,” which has actually helped Barnes & Noble.
“We used to have great, huge medical sections that taught doctors and nurses and all the other professionals. But those books are very boring,” he shared. “No more. You go onto Amazon, bump, it arrives through your letterbox three minutes later.”
Daunt is not just grandstanding: According to Bloomberg, sales at Barnes & Noble have been steadily rising since 2021. In 2024, the bookseller opened 57 stores, more than it did during the entire decade from 2009 to 2019. And this January, they announced plans to open 60+ more stores, bringing their total close to 700.
Barnes & Noble is opening 31 new stores by the end of 2025.
So far this year, Barnes & Noble has opened 34 new stores, most of which include a B&N Café, according to USA Today. Now, the retailer has shared the locations for the remaining 31 stores that will open before the year’s end. These include relocations of some previously closed stores.
Most of the new locations range from 14,000 to 20,000 square feet and include sections for toys, games, magazines, and gift items, in addition to thousands of books.
“It’s an exciting time for us,” Barnes & Noble said in a statement obtained by USA Today. “Sales in the new stores with their new design and format are exceeding our forecasts, people are lining up around the block for openings and with a strong Fall publishing we expect a great Holiday season.”
Barnes & Noble says the new stores will open in the following states (with some states getting more than one store): Washington, Louisiana, California, Tennessee, Idaho, Florida, New York, Connecticut, Texas, Colorado, Michigan, Washington D.C., Ohio, and Pennsylvania.
Though the company hasn’t released the exact locations of these 31 stores, USA Today compiled this list of the other new Barnes & Noble stores that have already opened in 2025:
Arizona
- Phoenix: 2011 E. Camelback Rd. (The Shops at Town & Country)
California
- Brentwood: 2475 Sand Creek Rd.
Colorado
- Superior: 550 Marshall Rd.
Connecticut
- Southbury: 775 Main St S. (Southbury Green shopping center)
- Stamford: 1145 High Ridge Rd.
Florida
- Miami: 13605 S Dixie Hwy (Colonial Palms Plaza)
- Naples: 4149 Tamiami Trail N.
- Tampa: 13123 N. Dale Mabry Hwy
- Tequesta: 151 N. US Highway 1
Illinois
- Naperville: 9 Jackson Ave.
Kansas
- Overland Park: 7840 W 161st St. (Bluhawk Mall)
Maryland
- Pasadena: 8044 Ritchie Highway (Pasadena Crossroads)
- Westminster: 402 Englar Rd. (Westminster Crossing West)
Michigan
- Grand Rapids: 2236 E. Beltline Ave NE
Minnesota
- Minnetonka: 11500 Wayzata Blvd. (WestRidge Market)
Nebraska
- Papillon: 7949 Towne Center Pkwy
New Jersey
- Clark: 1255 Raritan Rd. (Clark Commons)
New York
- Huntington Station: 301 Walt Whitman Rd.
Ohio
- Dublin: 3708 W. Dublin-Granville Road (Sun Center)
- North Canton: 5501 Dressler Rd.
Pennsylvania
- Bryn Mawr: 720 W. Lancaster Ave.
- York: 2935 Concord Rd. (York Town Center)
South Dakota
- Rapid City: 1617 Eglin St (Rushmore Crossing)
Tennessee
- Germantown: 2130 Exeter Rd. (Germantown Collection)
Texas
- Abilene: 3417 Catclaw Dr (Shops at Abilene)
- Houston: 12850 Memorial Drive
- Rockwall: 1009 E Interstate 30 (Plaza at Rockwall)
Virginia
- Gainesville: 8139 Stonewall Shops Square
- Glen Allen: 9840 Brook Rd.
Washington
- Bellevue: 1140 Bellevue Square
- Issaquah: 775 NW Gilman Blvd.
- Lakewood: 10330 59th Ave. Southwest (Lakewood Towne Center)
RELATED: Where Home Depot Is Opening New Stores This Year—And How Lowe’s Is Trying to Compete.
Barnes & Noble is also acquiring Books Inc.
In a press release, Barnes & Noble announced that it was acquiring the 174-year-old Bay Area bookseller Books Inc. in a $3.25 million bankruptcy sale.
Books Inc. currently has 9 locations, including two outposts in the San Francisco International Airport. Barnes & Noble confirmed in the press release that all locations would remain open, with the book seller continuing to operate independently. The main difference is that these stores will have access to Barnes & Noble’s distribution network and modern technology.
“This agreement will ensure that Book Inc.’s legacy will continue for the foreseeable future,” Books Inc. CEO Andy Perham said in a statement. “With Barnes & Noble’s deep resources and world-class support, Books Inc. will be able to quickly modernize its operations so we can focus on what we do best: connecting people with books, ideas, and each other.”
Last year, Barnes & Noble acquired Denver, Colorado’s Tattered Cover book stores after it filed for bankruptcy. Similarly, Barnes & Noble kept all four locations open (in addition to airport stores), operating independently with their same teams.
As for why Barnes & Noble has begun bailing out indie bookstores, Daunt explained his reasoning in an interview with Modern Retail:
“This is very much not Barnes & Noble roaming the countryside, looking for great indie bookstore chains and acquiring them,” he said. “These are very storied and rather remarkable bookstore chains, which, for all sorts of reasons, have gone bankrupt and are closing — literally closing their doors and disappearing — and we’re providing them a safe harbor, which we think is a worthwhile and important thing to do.”
The strategy also makes sense given Barnes & Noble’s shift to operate itself more like an independent, neighborhood book store.
And it doesn’t appear that the retailer will be slowing down any time soon. Barnes & Noble has said there’s “lots more to come in 2026!”