Leonard Riggio, the mastermind behind Barnes & Noble, has died at age 83.
Riggio died “following a valiant battle with Alzheimer’s illness,” in accordance with a press release issued by his household.
The innovator reworked the corporate from a single bookstore to “The World’s Largest Bookstore,” with 150,000 textbook and commerce titles, in 1971, the corporate mentioned.
“His management spanned a long time, throughout which he not solely grew the corporate but in addition nurtured a tradition of innovation and a love for studying,” a press release from Barnes & Noble mentioned. “Len’s imaginative and prescient and entrepreneurial spirit reworked the retail panorama.”
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In accordance to Barnes & Noble, Riggio created the idea of a “superstore” and reworked the trade by a sequence of acquisitions all through the Nineteen Seventies-Nineties.
“Our bookstores had been designed to be welcoming versus intimidating,” Riggio advised The New York Instances in 2016. “These weren’t elitist locations. You could possibly go in, get a cup of espresso, sit down and skim a ebook for so long as you want, use the restroom. These had been improvements that we had that nobody thought was potential.”
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In 1987, the corporate mentioned that the bookstore made its largest acquisition of 797 retail bookstores once they bought B. Dalton Booksellers together with Doublday Bookshops and BookStop.
The acquisition launched the shop to turn into the second-largest bookseller in America. The corporate is presently the #1 ebook retailer within the U.S.
Within the early Nineties, Riggio created the “superstore” idea, which, the corporate mentioned, “helped revolutionize bookselling by combining an enormous and deep number of ebook titles with an skilled bookselling workers in addition to a heat, comfy and spacious ambiance.”
Within the Nineties, Barnes & Noble turned their consideration to the altering panorama of the bookstore trade by investing in e-commerce.
In 1997, the shop launched their on-line retailer and entered the eBook market.
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Riggio offered the corporate in 2019 to Elliott, an activist investor group based by billionaire Paul Singer.
He stepped down in 2016, however held onto a large stake.
Riggio devoted his life to literacy, training and the humanities, supporting organizations together with the Kids’s Protection Fund, the Anti-Defamation League and the Dia, a recent artwork museum.
Alongside together with his spouse, Louise Riggion, the pair created Venture Dwelling Once more. The non-profit constructed and donated 101 properties in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina.
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He’s survived by his spouse, three kids and grandchildren.
The Related Press contributed to this report.