Barnes & Noble, Google partner on same-day book delivery

New York – Barnes & Noble Inc. and Google Inc. are reportedly teaming up on a pilot of same-day delivery of book orders from local Barnes & Noble stores in several U.S. cities. According to the New York Times, customers in Manhattan, West Los Angeles, and the San Francisco Bay area can have online book orders fulfilled from nearby Barnes & Noble locations via the Google Shopping service.



The service is free for Google Shopping members and $4.99 per order for other consumers. A dedicated employee onsite at participating stores will take online orders and then hand them off to Google for fulfillment via courier service.



Amazon.com, Wal-Mart and EBay all offer some type of same-day delivery program in certain markets, and Amazon recently expanded its same-day deliveries from six-to-10 cities. However, this pilot is obviously designed as a way for both Barnes & Noble and Google to challenge Amazon’s dominance of the online book market. Barnes & Noble has seen stagnant in-store sales (excepting its college segment) and sales of its Nook e-reader, and is eyeing digital sales as a potential growth area.