Barnes & Noble.com Launches BookBrowser

Posted on June 7, 2002

Barnes & Noble.com has announced the introduction of BookBrowser, a new browsing engine that allows customers to find books in more than 400,000 categories. Barnes & Noble.com engaged the software firm Endeca to incorporate Endeca InFront Guided Navigation solutions to power BookBrowser.

BookBrowser allows customers to locate books using a specific set of criteria. For example, under the horror category users will find the subject "vampires". Selecting "vampires" will bring up hundreds of vampire-related horror titles. Users can then dig even deeper into the vampire category by selecting more criteria such as "featured authors", "time period", "location" or "price". If the user then selects the "Middle Ages (400 -1499 C.E.)" from the time period category, then only vampire horror novels based in the Middle Ages are shown.

"'Our customers have told us that they want to browse online with the ease that they already enjoy in our stores. BookBrowser meets those needs," said Marie J. Toulantis, CEO of Barnes & Noble.com. "For the first time, book buyers everywhere have a simple yet powerful tool at their disposal to shop in a bookstore with millions of titles. The introduction of this unique book shopping feature, coupled with the largest in-stock selection and our free shipping offer, make Barnes & Noble.com the destination of choice for book lovers everywhere."

Barnes & Noble.com said its BookBrowser allows the same title can be "shelved" in multiple categories. For instance, Jack Welch's Jack, would be found browsing either Business or Biography and even Engineering. Barnes & Noble.com hired Endeca, a Boston-based technology company, to create the navigation and sorting system for BookBrowser.

"Endeca's InFront Guided Navigation delivers superior search and merchandising capabilities," said Steve Papa, founder and CEO of Endeca. "Barnes & Noble.com's large product catalog takes advantage of this easy-to-use shopping tool that provides consumers with the purchase options they are looking for."