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by aspiringsensei 5799 days ago
You seem to be assuming they own all of their retail stores. Is this true?
3 comments

On their balance sheet, under assets, they record about $812M worth of value for their net property, plant, and equipment. With 720 store locations that comes out to about $1M in value per store. That's probably understated by a lot because of the excess depreciation charge they take.
I would humbly submit that PP&E likely is dominated by warehousing facilities and books at a place like B&N. It may include some real estate, but I wouldn't bet on it representing the value of 720 store locations, even with aggressive depreciation schedules.

I would bet their PP&E likely has a large emphasis on esoteric distribution equipment, as well as some stores. I am just wildly speculating though: the business of selling books is too crappy (low cashflow yeilds) to get me interested enough to crack open a 10-k.

I'm not assuming that. I assume they lease a lot of their space like everyone else.
There's one at a mall near me... that's definitely leased.
Most of the Apple stores are leased also.
You can safely say that about every chain that is found in malls and shopping centers.