When I was in my local Best Buy this weekend, I spent some time exploring their ebook reader displays. A few months ago I was in Best Buy and noted the extent of their eReader display was a sad shelf of Sony Readers. Not terribly exciting, and worst of all it was off at a weird angle, sort of tucked away from the main aisles. If you didn’t venture through the middle of the store you wouldn’t find it.
Now that Best Buy is selling the Barnes and Noble nook, it’s a whole new ballgame. They cleaned up the Sony Reader display, with several nice sample readers mounted for testing. There was also a monitor with a video demoing the various Reader features. And if you’re hurting for a case for your Sony Reader, Best Buy had a huge selection.
The nook display was clearly where Best Buy was focusing their ebook reader efforts. It had a very prominent end cap facing the computer section, not far from the display of Macs. There were less accessories than the Sony display, but it had several working nooks and a handful of covers and cases. What really struck me though was the display location. It was nearly impossible to walk past computers without noticing the bright, white, clean shelf full of nooks and covers.
One thing that I wasn’t able to get a clear shot of was the instructional sheets Best Buy had for both ebook reader displays. Essentially it gave you clear bullet points on the high points for each device, and how to find, buy and load books. Granted it was very simplistic, but they clearly put effort into finding ways to educate consumers on the value of ebook readers.
Next time I am in Best Buy I will try to take better shots; I was a bit hampered by the Droid’s camera and my concerns that Best Buy wouldn’t take it well if I kept snapping shots of their displays.
Have you seen Best Buy’s ebook reader displays? What did you think? Share your thoughts below!
