Barnes & Noble to Open New Store at 12700 South Illinois Route 59 Plainfield, Illinois; New Bookstore Debuts on November 6.

Business Editors

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 23, 2002

Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS), the world's largest bookseller, will open a new 24,000-square-foot bookstore on November 6 in the Kensington Center at 12700 South Illinois Route 59, Plainfield, Illinois. The store will stock close to 200,000 book, music, DVD and magazine titles and include a cafe serving Starbucks coffee. The new Plainfield Barnes & Noble will be open from 9 a.m. to 11 p.m. everyday, and employ approximately 50 people from the community.

The public is invited to a Preview Night Party at the new Plainfield Barnes & Noble on Tuesday, November 5, from 6 to 9 p.m. A portion of the Preview Night sales will benefit the Plainfield Public Library. Throughout the evening, music will be provided by the Bravo String Quartet. At 7 p.m., a story time for children will be held with costume character Winnie the Pooh.

Barnes & Noble's bookselling innovations have established it as the number-one operator of retail bookstores in America. Its innovations include:

-- The Readers' Advantage membership program. Designed for Barnes & Noble's best customers, this program gives members an additional 10 percent off everything they buy. The annual fee is $25.

-- Rapid special-order service. Special orders have been commonplace in bookselling, but Barnes & Noble's new service takes it to new heights in terms of selection and speed of delivery. Its booksellers are able to instantly access the real-time inventory of every title in the company's distribution network, enabling its booksellers to order and confirm the availability of virtually any book in print at the click of a button. With more than one million titles available, Barnes & Noble stocks more books than any competing retail or online bookseller, and substantially more titles than even the largest book wholesalers.

-- Large-scale children's departments that are bigger than most typical bookstores. Stocking over 15,000 titles in an easy-to-browse environment, Barnes & Noble Junior departments are designed to appeal to children, parents, teachers and librarians. Children's story hours will be held three times a week.

-- The RedDotNet revolutionary music sampling system. The store's music department will feature RedDotNet, the most advanced listening technology, enabling customers to listen to any CD and sample up to 200,000 music titles in the store by simply passing it under a scanner. Connected to the company's online electronic music catalog, the store's listening stations make "browsing with your ears" a reality.

-- The Discover Great New Writers program. The leader in discovering new writers, the Discover program, now in its 13th year, has an unparalleled record of finding tomorrow's literary stars from today's publishing newcomers. Over the years, Discover has prominently featured and promoted such writers as Frank McCourt, Jonathan Franzen, Laura Hillenbrand, Hampton Sides and Tracy Chevalier.

"We have become the market leader because of our unparalleled selection, service, convenience and the most sophisticated inventory systems in all of bookselling," said Mitchell Klipper, chief operating officer of Barnes & Noble, Inc. "Our new rapid special-order systems enable us to offer our customers the largest selection and fastest delivery of any bookseller. In short, if we don't have it on our shelves, we'll get it for you and offer the convenience of in-store pickup or home delivery."

Store manager Jason Scroggs said, "Bookselling is a very local business. Underlying our success is our expertise at tailoring the selection of every store to the community it serves. I have the ability to order the books my customers need and adjust the selection to the lifestyles and interests of this community. We also plan to have an ongoing series of author signing and book discussion groups."

About Barnes & Noble, Inc.

Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS) is the world's largest bookseller, operating 606 Barnes & Noble bookstores in 49 states. It also operates 286 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 1,128 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.

--30--JP/ny csm

    CONTACT: Corporate Communications
             Barnes & Noble, Inc.
             Christine Tzen, 212/633-3379
             [e-mail]
             or
             Lilja, Inc.
             Kristi Nelson, 952/893-7140
             [e-mail]

    KEYWORD: NEW YORK
    INDUSTRY KEYWORD: RETAIL REAL ESTATE PUBLISHING CONSUMER/HOUSEHOLD
    SOURCE: Barnes & Noble, Inc.