Barnes & Noble to Open New Store at 801 Lehigh Lifestyle Center Whitehall, Pennsylvania.

New Bookstore Debuts on October 31

NEW YORK -- Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS), the world's largest bookseller, will open a new bookstore on October 31 in The Outdoor Shops at Lehigh Valley Mall at 801 Lehigh Lifestyle Center, Whitehall, Pennsylvania. Concurrently, the existing store at 2590 MacArthur Road will close. The store will stock close to 200,000 book, music, DVD and magazine titles and include a cafe serving Starbucks coffee. The new Whitehall Barnes & Noble will be open from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Sunday, and employ approximately 60 people from the community.

The public is invited to a Preview Night Party at the new Whitehall Barnes & Noble on Tuesday, October 30, from 6 to 9 p.m. A portion of the Preview Night sales will benefit the Allentown School District. Local guitarist Jim Batchelor will perform at 6:30 p.m. The Pennsylvania Youth Theatre will perform scenes from their production, Harriet's Halloween Candy, at 6:30 p.m. Sheridan Elementary School Principal Michele Ryan will host Storytime at 7 p.m. Barnes & Noble booksellers will be dressed as a host of favorite literary characters. Guests are invited to dress up as well.

Barnes & Noble's bookselling innovations have established it as America's top bookseller brand. For the fourth year in a row, the EquiTrend[R] Brand Study by Harris Interactive[R] named Barnes & Noble bookstores number one in overall brand equity, which is based on a brand's strength in familiarity, quality and purchase intent. The new store will feature:

* The Barnes & Noble Membership Program. Designed for Barnes & Noble's best customers, this program gives Members 40% off hardcover fiction and nonfiction bestsellers, 20% off all other adult hardcover books, and 10% off virtually everything else in Barnes & Noble stores and online at Barnes & Noble.com. The annual fee is $25.

* Rapid special-order service. Can't find it on the shelf? Barnes & Noble's massive warehouse inventory is available in real-time, enabling its booksellers to order and confirm the availability of over one million titles at the click of a button.

* Large-scale children's departments. Bigger than most typical bookstores and stocking over 15,000 titles in an easy-to-browse environment, "Barnes & Noble Jr." departments are designed to appeal to children, parents, teachers and librarians. Youth-sized chairs and tables offer children a comfortable setting to enjoy their favorite selections. Children's story hours with local favorite Carly Simon will be held every Tuesday and Friday at 10 a.m., featuring children's stories as well as arts and crafts.

* Advanced technology music-listening and movie-previewing system. The store's music department will feature RedDotNet, the most advanced listening and previewing technology. RedDotNet enables customers to listen to any CD in the store, sampling up to 270,000 music titles 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. Thanks to the latest technology, RedDotNet stations also allow customers to view a three-minute clip of up to 60,000 DVDs.

* Giant Newsstand. The store's newsstand stocks over 2,000 titles, including hundreds of hard-to-find specialty magazines and out-of-town newspapers.

* Wi-Fi Service. AT&T Wi-Fi(SM) service allows customers to use their laptop computers and personal digital assistants anywhere in the store or cafe to communicate online, surf the Internet and connect to corporate networks at speeds 50 to 100 times as fast as a dial-up connection. A single two-hour session costs $3.95, and an annual membership with unlimited access to Barnes & Noble and more than 10,700 AT&T Wi-Fi hot spots is available for $19.95 per month (with a one-year commitment).

* Community Center. The Barnes & Noble store will serve as a local community center, hosting a number of community events throughout the year. They will include author readings and discussions, book clubs, and programs with local literary and cultural organizations. The store will also hold bookfairs, partnering with local schools and other community institutions. For more information, please contact Sandra Salomonsen at [phone].

About Barnes & Noble, Inc.

Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS), the world's largest bookseller and a Fortune 500 company, operates 792 bookstores in 50 states. For the fourth year in a row, the company is the nation's top bookseller brand, as determined by a brand's overall strength based on its combination of familiarity, quality and purchase intent, according to the EquiTrend[R] Brand Study by Harris Interactive[R]. Barnes & Noble conducts its online business through Barnes & Noble.com (www.bn.com), one of the Web's largest e-commerce sites.

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