Barnes & Noble Reports Comparable Store Sales for March.

Business Editors

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 11, 2002

Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE:BKS), the world's largest bookseller, today reported that comparable store sales for the month of March increased 3.7 percent.

Barnes & Noble store sales were strong across all categories. New titles topping the bestseller lists include Lucky Man: A Memoir by Michael J. Fox, The Nanny Diaries by Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus, Three Fates by Nora Roberts and Everything's Eventual: 14 Dark Tales by Stephen King.

Comparable store sales at B. Dalton Bookseller, which comprises 8.0 percent of total bookstore sales, increased 0.4 percent in March.

GameStop will report first-quarter sales and earnings on May 20, 2002.

ABOUT BARNES & NOBLE, INC.

Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS) is the world's largest bookseller, operating 591 Barnes & Noble bookstores in 49 states. It also operates 305 B. Dalton Bookseller stores, primarily in regional shopping malls. The company offers titles from more than 50,000 publisher imprints, including thousands of small, independent publishers and university presses. It conducts its e-commerce business through Barnes & Noble.com (http://www.bn.com) in which it owns a 36 percent interest.

Barnes & Noble also has approximately a 60 percent interest in GameStop (NYSE: GME), the nation's largest video-game and entertainment-software specialty retailer with 1,038 stores.

General financial information on Barnes & Noble, Inc. can be obtained via the Internet by visiting the company's corporate Web site: http://www.barnesandnobleinc.com/financials.

SAFE HARBOR 

This press release contains "forward-looking statements." Barnes & Noble is including this statement for the express purpose of availing itself of the protections of the safe harbor provided by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 with respect to all such forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are based on currently available information and represent the beliefs of the management of the company. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. These risks include, but are not limited to, general economic and market conditions, decreased consumer demand for the company's products, possible disruptions in the company's computer or telephone systems, possible work stoppages or increases in labor costs, possible increases in shipping rates or interruptions in shipping service, effects of competition, possible disruptions or delays in the opening of new stores or the inability to obtain suitable sites for new stores, higher than anticipated store closing or relocation costs, higher interest rates, the performance of the company's online and other initiatives, the successful integration of acquired businesses, unanticipated increases in merchandise or occupancy costs, unanticipated adverse litigation results or effects, product shortages, and other factors which may be outside of the company's control. Please refer to the company's annual, quarterly and periodic reports on file with the SEC for a more detailed discussion of these and other risks that could cause results to differ materially.