Barnes & Noble Appoints Timothy Mantel as Chief Merchandising Officer

Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS), the world’s largest retail bookseller, today announced that Timothy Mantel has been named Chief Merchandising Officer. Mr. Mantel, whose appointment is effective immediately, will report to Demos Parneros, Chief Executive Officer of Barnes & Noble. In his new role as CMO, Mr. Mantel will be responsible for driving sales and profitability in all areas of merchandising within the Company, including Books, Toys & Games, Gift, Newsstand and Music and Entertainment.

Mr. Mantel previously held the role of Chief Merchandising Officer for GNC Corporation, where he led a $2.6 billion product portfolio and helped relaunch the company’s business model. He also successfully streamlined and reinvigorated GNC’s owned brand portfolio positioning it for sales and margin growth now and in the future.

Prior to that, Mr. Mantel was Senior Vice President, Food, Household Essentials and Food Service at Target Corporation, where he led a $20.9 billion merchandising group with 19 teams and 320 employees. He directed strategic repositioning of the business to achieve online and store growth, as well as overseeing assortment planning, store presentation, marketing and pricing.  Mr. Mantel had previously served as President Target Sourcing Services and held various positions from business analyst to buyer and merchandise planning director early in his career.

“We are thrilled that Tim will be taking on the important role of Chief Merchandising Officer for Barnes & Noble,” said Mr. Parneros. “His deep knowledge of retail and proven track record are exactly what we need to invigorate our merchandising strategy and grow our business. He will be a great addition to our management team.”

Mr. Mantel is a graduate of The University of Wisconsin’s Madison School of Business, where he studied Marketing and International Business. He has served on various boards including Nibakure Children’s Village, a nonprofit that helps communities in Rwanda, as well as the Retail Industry Leaders Association Apparel Coalition.

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Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS) is the world’s largest retail bookseller, and a leading retailer of content, digital media and educational products.  The Company operates 632 Barnes & Noble bookstores in 50 states, and one of the Web’s premier e-commerce sites, BN.com (www.bn.com).  The Nook Digital business offers a lineup of popular NOOK^® tablets and eReaders and an expansive collection of digital reading and entertainment content through the NOOK Store^®. The NOOK Store features more than 4.5 million digital books in the US (www.nook.com), plus periodicals and comics, and offers the ability to enjoy content across a wide array of popular devices through Free NOOK Reading Apps^™ available for Android^™, iOS^® and Windows^®.

General information on Barnes & Noble, Inc. can be obtained by visiting the Company’s corporate website at www.barnesandnobleinc.com.

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