Following PW’s recent coverage of customer traffic patterns at Barnes & Noble, we asked Placer.ai if they could do a similar report on B&N’s bricks-and-mortar rivals Books-A-Million and Half Price Books. While B&N’s customer traffic in 2024 has been notably better than traffic at BAM and Half Price, both chains have had their own successes.
What is striking about Half Price in particular is the big increase in customer traffic the bookstore chain experienced last November and December, when visits soared over 2022. The Texas-based Half Price has had a tougher time than B&N in ramping up customer visits in 2024, trailing B&N in every month this year. BAM has also failed to keep pace with B&N in 2024, with only one month, March, in which customer traffic rose by more than 1% over 2023, according to Placer.ai.
Indeed, the data for 2024 for all three bookstore chains showed a similar pattern. A good March was followed by a tough April, explained in part by a March Easter this year compared to an April Easter last year. Store visits were up again compared to 2023 at all three booksellers in May, though neither BAM nor Half Price came close to matching the 10.9% increase posted by B&N in the month. (Placer.ai uses de-identified location data from a panel of tens of millions of mobile devices, which the company then leverages by using AI and machine learning capabilities to make estimates about overall visits to any location).
In analyzing how BAM and Half Price did against their own performances—that is, how monthly visits did compared to a baseline month of visits in 2023—both showed improvement. One finding suggested that the holiday season is particularly important for BAM. Customer traffic in November and December was much greater at BAM from an April base compared to traffic at Half Price and B&N, with December store visits nearly doubling that of April.
Looking at the customer traffic patterns across all three chains, it's encouraging that the public still seems to find bookstores a good place to visit—and, hopefully, buy a book.
Foot Traffic Changes at U.S. Bookstore Chains
| Year Over Year Change | Books-A-Million | Half Price Books | Barnes & Noble |
| November 2023 | 3.8% | 13.5% | 6.7% |
| December 2023 | 4.2% | 17.7% | 5.8% |
| January 2024 | -1.4% | -1.9% | -1.7% |
| February 2024 | 0.2% | -0.4% | 6.8% |
| March 2024 | 2.9% | 3.0% | 8.7% |
| April 2024 | -9.7% | -5.1% | 0.4% |
| May 2024 | 0.9% | 1.2% | 10.9% |
| Monthly Change | Books-A-Million | Half Price Books | Barnes & Noble |
| April 2023 (baseline) | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| May 2023 | -0.3% | 6.4% | 0.1% |
| June 2023 | 3.1% | 11.0% | 6.6% |
| July 2023 | 13.9% | 19.9% | 13.5% |
| August 2023 | 5.2% | 10.7% | 10.6% |
| September 2023 | -2.0% | 6.8% | 0.9% |
| October 2023 | -3.6% | -3.6% | -2.2% |
| November 2023 | 13.7% | -0.3% | 10.7% |
| December 2023 | 98.3% | 47.4% | 86.7% |
| January 2024 | 7.0% | 9.9% | 15.2% |
| February 2024 | -4.3% | -4.7% | 2.4% |
| March 2024 | 7.6% | 10.3% | 15.8% |
| April 2024 | -9.7% | -5.1% | 0.4% |
| May 2024 | 0.6% | 7.6% | 11.1% |
Source: Placer.ai
