What it is: Revenue is Course Materials Product (70%), General Merchandise Product (24%) and Service and Other (6%).
What moves the needle: Operating margin has run around −2.4% through the cycle on a 23% gross margin, the operating line deeply negative — so the lever is the path to a margin at all: revenue growth against the cost curve and the cash runway, not the level of a margin that isn't there yet. Inventory runs near 20% of sales, so how fast it turns back into cash — and the risk of writing it down when demand softens — sits alongside the margin. On its own account, the filing leans hardest on pricing power & competition, set against the numbers in what the filing emphasizes, below.
Is it a good business?: Return on capital has rarely cleared the cost of capital (median −8%, above 15% in 0 of 10 years). Owner earnings, the cash-based check, have been thin too. This is price-taker territory, where the balance sheet and the cycle matter more than any multiple; the rest is in the 10-K.

Every line is arithmetic on the company's filings, shown in full in the sections below.

Where the money comes from

read the 10-K →

Course Materials Product is 70% of revenue, with General Merchandise Product the other meaningful line at 24%.

Revenue by product line, FY2025

Course Materials Product70%$1.0B
General Merchandise Product24%$355M
Service and Other6%$87M

From the segment footnote of the company's own 10-K. Shares are of total revenue; the profit bar shows each segment's share of segment operating profit, before unallocated corporate costs.

The record

Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.

The record, 2017–2026

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left

2017’17	2018’18	2019’19	2020’20	2021’21	2022’22	2023’23	2024’24	2025’25	2026’26	TTMTTMMay 2026
											Income statement
$1.9B	$2.2B	$2.0B	$1.9B	$1.4B	$1.5B	$1.5B	$1.4B	$1.5B	$1.6B	$1.6B	RevenueRevenue
24%	25%	26%	24%	16%	23%	23%	15%	13%	14%	14%	Gross marginGross mgn
20%	20%	21%	22%	22%	24%	23%	22%	19%	18%	18%	SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
$14M	($263M)	($28M)	($43M)	($169M)	($61M)	($66M)	($34M)	$16M	$37M	$37M	Operating incomeOp. inc.
0.7%	−11.9%	−1.4%	−2.3%	−12.0%	−4.1%	−4.3%	−2.4%	1.1%	2.3%	2.3%	Operating marginOp. mgn
$5M	($253M)	($24M)	($38M)	($140M)	($69M)	($102M)	($76M)	($66M)	$17M	$17M	Net incomeNet inc.
47%	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	18%	18%	Effective tax rateTax rate
											Cash flow & returns
$68M	$60M	$122M	($9M)	$33M	$1M	$92M	($5M)	($85M)	$50M	$50M	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$53M	$66M	$66M	$62M	$45M	$42M	$42M	$41M	$38M	$33M	$33M	DepreciationDeprec.
($59K)	$239M	$71M	($39M)	$123M	$22M	$147M	$27M	($63M)	($6M)	($6M)	Working capital & otherWC & other
$35M	$43M	$46M	$36M	$28M	$34M	$25M	$14M	$13M	$16M	$16M	CapexCapex
1.8%	1.9%	2.3%	2.0%	2.0%	2.2%	1.6%	1.0%	0.9%	1.0%	1.0%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$33M	$17M	$75M	($45M)	$5M	($32M)	$67M	($19M)	($98M)	$34M	$34M	Owner earningsOwner earn.
1.8%	0.8%	3.7%	−2.4%	0.4%	−2.2%	4.3%	−1.3%	−6.7%	2.2%	2.2%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$33M	$17M	$75M	($45M)	$5M	($32M)	$67M	($19M)	($98M)	$34M	$34M	Free cash flowFCF
1.8%	0.8%	3.7%	−2.4%	0.4%	−2.2%	4.3%	−1.3%	−6.7%	2.2%	2.2%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$187M	$58M	$10M	$0	$0	—	—	—	—	—	$0	AcquisitionsAcquis.
$9M	$2M	$2M	$1M	$894K	$2M	$864K	$176K	$5K	$0	—	BuybacksBuybacks
1%	-38%	-5%	-7%	-32%	-11%	-12%	-10%	3%	8%	6%	ROICROIC
1%	-54%	-5%	-9%	-48%	-30%	-67%	-94%	-24%	6%	6%	Return on equityROE
1%	−54%	−5%	−9%	−48%	−30%	−67%	−94%	−24%	6%	6%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
											Balance sheet
$19M	$16M	$14M	$8M	$8M	$9M	$8M	$8M	$9M	$8M	$8M	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
$86M	$100M	$98M	$91M	$121M	$136M	$141M	$315M	$98M	$117M	$117M	ReceivablesReceiv.
$434M	$444M	$420M	$429M	$281M	$294M	$384M	$342M	$300M	$298M	$298M	InventoryInvent.
$193M	$188M	$187M	$144M	$138M	$183M	$275M	$343M	$149M	$136M	$136M	Accounts payablePayables
$327M	$356M	$332M	$376M	$265M	$247M	$250M	$314M	$249M	$279M	$279M	Operating working capitalOper. WC
$603M	$619M	$591M	$585M	$501M	$532M	$596M	$761M	$465M	$484M	$484M	Current assetsCur. assets
$413M	$413M	$409M	$407M	$374M	$415M	$467M	$839M	$279M	$284M	$284M	Current liabilitiesCur. liab.
1.5×	1.5×	1.4×	1.4×	1.3×	1.3×	1.3×	0.9×	1.7×	1.7×	1.7×	Current ratioCurr. ratio
$329M	$49M	$5M	$5M	$5M	$5M	—	—	—	—	$5M	GoodwillGoodwill
$1.3B	$1.0B	$946M	$1.2B	$1.0B	$1.1B	$1.0B	$1.2B	$790M	$740M	$740M	Total assetsAssets
$60M	$96M	$34M	$100M	$128M	$226M	$278M	$196M	$103M	$71M	$222M	Total debtDebt
$41M	$80M	$19M	$91M	$120M	$217M	$270M	$188M	$94M	$63M	$213M	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
$714M	$468M	$451M	$418M	$293M	$228M	$153M	$80M	$272M	$294M	$294M	Shareholders’ equityEquity
0.5%	0.4%	0.4%	0.4%	0.3%	0.4%	0.3%	0.2%	0.4%	0.4%	0.4%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
—	$313M	$49M	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	$49M	Goodwill written downGW imp.
											Per share
23.4M	23.4M	23.7M	24.0M	24.8M	25.9M	26.4M	26.6M	26.3M	34.6M	34.6M	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$80.16	$94.25	$86.02	$77.11	$56.64	$57.75	$58.50	$53.73	$55.64	$45.19	$45.19	Revenue / shareRev/sh
$0.23	$-10.80	$-1.03	$-1.59	$-5.63	$-2.66	$-3.86	$-2.85	$-2.50	$0.49	$0.49	EPS (diluted)EPS
$1.42	$0.74	$3.19	$-1.87	$0.21	$-1.25	$2.52	$-0.72	$-3.74	$0.98	$0.98	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$1.42	$0.74	$3.19	$-1.87	$0.21	$-1.25	$2.52	$-0.72	$-3.74	$0.98	$0.98	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$1.48	$1.83	$1.96	$1.51	$1.11	$1.30	$0.95	$0.53	$0.49	$0.47	$0.47	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$30.52	$20.01	$19.05	$17.40	$11.80	$8.82	$5.80	$3.02	$10.35	$8.51	$8.51	Book value / shareBVPS

Share counts before 2023 are restated ×1/20 for a stock split, so per-share figures sit on one basis.

Share counts before 2025 are restated ×10 for a stock split, so per-share figures sit on one basis.

Per-share growththe realized rate an owner's share compounded

	9-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	−6.2%/yr	−4.4%/yr
Owner earnings / share	−4.1%/yr	+35.4%/yr
EPS	+8.7%/yr	—
Capital spending / share	−12.0%/yr	−15.9%/yr
Book value / share	−13.2%/yr	−6.3%/yr

The record, charted

FY2017–2026

Each measure over its full record; the current point and the worst year marked. Share counts on the current split basis.

Share count

35Mpeak FY2026

ROIC

8%low FY2018

Gross margin

14%low FY2025

Net debt ÷ owner earnings

1.8×peak FY2021

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

The accountant's number, and the cash an owner can take; the gap is the tell.

$34Mowner earningsvs.$17Mnet incomelow FY2025

Where the cash went

ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetainedBeyond op. cash

Each year's outlays against its operating cash: the mix, and how it drifts. The hatched cap is spending beyond that year's operating cash — financed from the balance sheet or borrowing, not operations.

FY2017FY2026

Owner-earnings bridge

FY2022–FY2026cash-flow statement, SEC EDGAR →

Net income is the accountant's number; owner earnings is the cash an owner could take out. The walk between them, off the cash-flow statement, and whether the gap is widening or holding.

In fiscal 2026 the business turned $17M of profit into $34M of owner earnings: more cash than the profit line showed, after the non-cash charges and the capital it put back in.

Reported net income$17M

Owner earnings$34M · 2% of revenue

	FY2026	FY2025	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022
Reported net income	$17M	($66M)	($76M)	($102M)	($69M)
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$33M	+$38M	+$41M	+$42M	+$42M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	+$6M	+$5M	+$3M	+$5M	+$6M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	−$6M	−$63M	+$27M	+$147M	+$22M
Cash from operations	$50M	($85M)	($5M)	$92M	$1M
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$16M	−$13M	−$14M	−$25M	−$34M
Owner earnings	$34M	($98M)	($19M)	$67M	($32M)
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	2%	-7%	-1%	4%	-2%

Owner earnings is the cash an owner could pull out without starving the business: operating cash less the capital it must spend to hold its position . The cash-flow statement also adds stock comp back as non-cash, but it is a real cost paid in shares; counted as the expense it is (less $6M), owner earnings is nearer $28M.

Maintenance capex is estimated as depreciation where a growing business invests above it; free cash flow is the figure the scorecard's free-cash margin reads.

III

Quality & stewardship

Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.

Owner’s Scorecard

FY2026 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →

Restated past financials

“AND SUBSIDIARIES Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements - Continued (In thousands, except share and per share data) The following presents the restated unaudited quarterly condensed financial statements for the quarter and year to date Restated Periods.”

The figures below are only as sound as the controls that produced them. read the note →

Will it survive?

Can it pay its interest? —

Interest expense not tagged in the data

What this means
No usable interest-expense line was tagged in the filing data, but the balance sheet carries real net debt — so the interest burden here is unknown, not absent. Read the debt on the net-debt check below.
How heavy is the debt, net of cash? $188M · 5.1× operating profit

Heavy net debt

Cash $8M − debt $196M

What this means
Netting $8M of cash and short-term investments against $196M of debt leaves $188M owed, about 5.1× a year's operating profit (5.4× on the gross debt, before the cash). Net debt is the leverage figure that matters: the cash is already set against the debt. Strategic or illiquid investments aren't counted here.
How long is cash tied up? 71d

Long (60+ days)

DSO 27 + DIO 81 − DPO 37 days

What this means
Days cash is tied up between paying suppliers and collecting from customers. Lower is better; a long cycle means growth itself eats cash.

Is it a good business?

Return on invested capital -10%

Below average through the cycle

10-yr median, range -38%–8%; 6% latest = NOPAT $30M ÷ invested capital $482M

Industry peers: median 25%

What this means
The rate the business earns on the money tied up in it, Buffett's north star, because over time a stock tracks the ROIC beneath it. Above ~15% sustained hints at a moat; a return below the cost of capital (~8%) erodes value as a business grows rather than building it — the test Buffett weighs most. The headline is the median of the last 10 years (it ran 6% most recently), so one peak or trough year doesn't set the verdict. Asset-light businesses (R&D expensed, little capital) read artificially high, pair this with Owner Earnings.
Owner-earnings margin 0%

Thin through the cycle

10-yr median margin, range -7%–4%; latest $34M = operating cash $50M − maintenance capex $16M

Industry peers: median 7%

What this means
What an owner could take out without starving the business: operating cash less the maintenance capital it must spend to hold its position — Buffett's owner earnings. That's 2% of revenue this year, a 0% median across 10 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $6M of SBC) leaves $28M.
Are earnings backed by cash? 2.97×

Cash-backed

Cash from ops $50M ÷ net income $17M

In the filing’s words The filing discloses a restatement of previously reported figures — some numbers in the record have moved since they were first filed; read what changed, and why, before trusting the trend.

What this means
How much of reported profit showed up as operating cash. Above 1× is reassuring; well below suggests earnings lean on accruals. One year is noisy, growth and working-capital swings distort it, and this is operating cash, not free cash. Watch the multi-year trend.

How is the cash used?

Where do the earnings go? 0%

Reinvests most of it

Dividends + buybacks $0 ÷ Owner Earnings $34M

What this means
Of $34M Owner Earnings, $0 (0%) went back to shareholders, $0 dividends, $0 buybacks. Returning most of it is the mark of a mature business with little left to reinvest at a high return; reinvesting most could mean a long runway, or empire-building. The split doesn't say which; the return earned on it (see ROIC) does.
Investing or harvesting? 0.49×

Harvesting

Capex $16M ÷ depreciation $33M

What this means
Descriptive, not a grade. Above ~1× means investing faster than assets wear out (growth, or, sustained for years, today's earnings carrying less depreciation than tomorrow's will). Below means spending less than it's wearing out (efficiency, or a melting asset base). The ratio won't tell you which; the filings will.

Graham’s defensive tests · 1 of 5 met

Graham’s numerical criteria for the defensive investor (The Intelligent Investor, ch. 14), run on the filings. A floor of safety, not a buy signal; many fine modern businesses fail his strictest liquidity rules by design.

Adequate size Near

Revenue ≥ $2B · $1.6B

What this means
Big enough to weather a storm. Graham's 1972 floor was ~$100M of sales (≈ $700M today); we use a $2B revenue line as a conservative modern stand-in.
Strong liquidity Near

Current ratio ≥ 2× · 1.71×

What this means
Current assets at least twice current liabilities, near-term bills covered without touching the business. Strict by design: many cash-rich modern firms run leaner and miss it, holding their cushion in longer-dated securities.
Conservative debt Pass

Debt ≤ working capital · $196M vs $201M WC

What this means
Graham's rule that borrowings not exceed net current assets. Capital-heavy and buyback-heavy firms routinely fail it, read it next to interest coverage, not alone.
Earnings stability Miss

A profit every year (10-yr record) · 8 loss years

What this means
Graham wanted earnings in each of the past ten years, the stability a defensive owner leans on.
Dividend record Miss

Uninterrupted dividends · none paid

What this means
An unbroken dividend was Graham's mark of durability. He wanted twenty years; the filings show about ten, and a single suspension breaks the streak. Non-payers, many fine modern compounders, fall outside his defensive net by design.
Earnings growth —

Earnings +33% over the record · —

What this means
Earnings were negative early in the record, a growth rate isn't meaningful.
Moderate price —

P/E ≤ 15 and P/E × P/B ≤ 22.5 · decided by the price

What this means
Graham's valuation gate, the wall he kept between a sound business and a sound investment. Three-year average earnings are $-1.20/share (latest year $0.49), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $8.50/share. Enter a price in “What the price implies” just below for the P/E, P/B, and whether it clears. But this is the rule Buffett outgrew: there's no hard P/E law, and a wonderful business can deserve a far richer multiple if the thesis holds, treat it as the bargain-hunter's floor, not a verdict on the price.

Durability & moat, 2017–2026

Whether the record’s returns held, and what the capital reinvested earned.

Profitable years 2 of 10

What this means
Lost money in 8 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
Return on capital ≥ 15% 0 of 10 yrs

What this means
A moat shows up as a high return on invested capital that holds year after year, not one good vintage.
Operating margin −4% → 0% (3-yr avg ends)

What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin widened — about −4% early to 0% lately, median −2% — pricing power intact or improving.
Reinvestment, incremental ROIC returns capital

What this means
The capital base barely grew: this business returns cash through dividends and buybacks rather than reinvesting. Judge it on the cash returned, not on compounding.
Worst year 2021 · −12.0% op. margin

What this means
Operations went underwater in 2021, understand why before trusting the good years.
Share count −3.3%/yr

What this means
The share count is shrinking, buybacks are quietly growing your slice of the business.
How management talks about it Owner’s terms

What this means
The record and the register agree: capital is compounding and the filing reasons in an owner’s terms — per-share value, return on capital, the long term — not a promoter’s.

Does AI threaten the moat?

Moderate contestability

AI is likely to reshape costs and some products here without clearly contesting or sparing the core moat; how the company itself frames it is the tell.

The question is whether a moat the record shows as durable outlasts a technology that lowers the cost of part of what the firm sells. The durability is read in the record above, the filing's own framing of AI beside it; the industry label decides nothing on its own.

Read from the filing's own risk factors, paired with the industry's structure under its SIC code; the durability is read above, the price below.

All figures as filed; the source filing is linked above.

Current Position

as of fiscal year-end, May 2, 2026

Can the business pay what it owes this year, off the freshest balance sheet: the quality of the assets, the debt actually coming due, and what a low ratio means here.

Current assets$484M

Cash & short-term investments$8M
Receivables$117M
Inventory$298M
Other current assets$61M

Current liabilities$284M

Accounts payable$136M
Other current liabilities$148M

Current ratio1.71×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×

Quick ratio0.66×stricter: inventory excluded

Cash ratio0.03×strictest: cash alone against what's due

Working capital$201Mthe cushion left after near-term bills

Revenue, latest quarter vs. a year ago+11.3%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing

Current ratio, recent quarters1.3× → 1.7×

Deeper floors

Tangible book value$232Mequity stripped of goodwill & intangibles

Net current asset value$39MGraham's net-net: current assets less all liabilities

Debt incl. operating leases$224M$153M of it operating leases

Deferred revenue$13Mcustomer cash collected before delivery; operating float

From the company's latest filing.

How the cash was used, 2017–2026

Over the record, the business generated $326M of operating cash; how management split it reads as a reinvestor, most operating cash is plowed back into the business.

Reinvested$290M · 89%
Buybacks$19M · 6%
Retained (debt / cash)$18M · 6%

Returned to owners$19M
50% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $0 as dividends and $19M as buybacks.
Source of fundingOperating cash
Operating cash covered reinvestment and returns; over the span debt rose $162M and cash and short-term investments fell $11M.
Average price paid for buybacks$27.30
Across the years where the filing reports a share count, 0M shares were bought for $9M, about $27.30 each.
Net change in share count48.0%
The diluted count rose from 23M to 35M: issuance (stock pay, deals) outran any buybacks, so owners were diluted on net.
Dividend record—
No dividend line was reported in the filing data over the span; the record here neither confirms nor rules out a payout.

Buybacks are gross of stock issued to staff; the share-count line above is the net of that, the figure that decides whether owners gained. The average price paid blends a year of purchases (and any accelerated repurchase), so it is close, not exact. The record of where the cash went and on what terms.

Acquisitions & goodwill

from the balance sheet & the 10-year cash-flow record

Goodwill grows only when a company acquires and falls only when it concedes it overpaid. The size of that bet, the cash put into buying rather than building, and how much has already been written off.

Goodwill & intangibles$63M8% of all assets; the premium carried on the balance sheet for businesses acquired

Against book equity2%goodwill is this share of book equity; the rest is the company’s own retained and paid-in capital

Cash spent acquiring$255Mover 10 years buying other businesses, against $290M of capital spent building

$362M written down across 2 years (2018, 2019): goodwill the company has already conceded it overpaid for, charged against earnings. A write-down costs no cash (the cash went out when the deal was signed), but it is management marking its own past judgment to market.

Goodwill, acquired intangibles and equity from the latest balance sheet; acquisition spend and write-downs summed across the 10-year record, from the company's own filings.

Management, ownership & pay

read the proxy →

From the proxy: how much of the business the people running it own, and how they are paid, beside what the business earned for its owners in the same years.

Fiscal year	Pay, as filed	“Actually paid”	Owner earnings
2023	$1.9M	−$135k	$67M
2024	$1.8M	$895k	($19M)
2025	$2.2M	$2.1M	($98M)
2025	$4.2M	$4.4M	($98M)

Both pay figures are the company’s own, from the pay-versus-performance table its proxy statement files. “As filed” is the Summary Compensation Table total: salary, bonus, and equity awards at their value on the day of grant. “Actually paid” is the SEC’s prescribed recalculation, which re-marks those equity awards to what they became as they vested; it can swing far above or below the filed figure in either direction, and negative years occur. Owner earnings are the whole business's, from the record above, for the same fiscal years.

Insider ownership1.2%
The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.
Stock-based compensation$6M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 0% of revenue, equal to 17% of operating profit. Buffett's oldest accounting fight: this is compensation, compensation is an expense, real whether or not the headline earnings admit it. One trap: the cash-flow statement adds SBC back, so the operating cash, and the owner earnings drawn from it, are flattered by exactly this amount; counted as the cost it is, what an owner keeps is lower.

Inverting the record

Invert: instead of why Barnes & Noble Education Inc is a good business, the question is what would make owning it a mistake, and whether those marks are in the record. Disconfirming tests across 2017–2026.

3 of the 5 tests turned up something to look into; the other 2 came back clean.

Look hereDid the share count rise anyway?48.0%
Diluted shares grew 48.0% over 2017–2026, even as the company spent $19M on buybacks. The repurchases were outrun by issuance — to staff, in a raise, or in a deal — and the filing says which; owners' slice still shrank. Read the buyback line beside this one, not on its own.
Look hereDid debt outgrow the business?$60M → $222M
Debt rose from $60M to $222M while owner earnings went from about $42M to ($28M): the borrowing grew and the earnings that would carry it are not there now. Debt raised for buybacks or deals rather than growth is the kind that bites in a downturn.
Look hereAre "one-time" charges a yearly habit?6 of 10 years
Management took an impairment or write-down in 6 of the last 10 years, $384M in all. Taken across the majority of the record, the "one-time" label is wearing thin — ask whether these are past deals coming due rather than genuinely isolated events. Read it beside the goodwill the company still carries.

And these came back clean

Is it less profitable than it was?
Did receivables and inventory outpace sales?

Each test is read from the filings and is noisy alone; a flag can mark a cyclical trough or a year of heavy investment as easily as a problem. The filing says which.

Peers, Specialty Retail

The same industry, side by side on owner economics. Each figure is a through-cycle median, so a peak or trough year can’t distort it; the group median at the foot is the line to read each against.

Company	Revenue	Gross margin	Op. margin	ROIC	Owner earn. margin
ASOAcademy Sports and Outdoors	$6.1B	34%	8.8%	25%	7%
SGUStar Group L.P.	$1.8B	62%	4.1%	—	4%
SVVSavers Value Village Inc.	$1.7B	—	9.0%	11%	4%
FCFSFirstCash Holdings Inc.	$1.7B	39%	21.7%	8%	19%
BNEDBarnes & Noble Education Inc	$1.6B	23%	-2.3%	-8%	1%
GRDNGuardian Pharmacy Services Inc.	$1.4B	20%	5.0%	32%	6%
SPHSuburban Propane Partners L.P.	$1.4B	60%	12.8%	—	12%
GCTGigaCloud Technology Inc	$1.3B	—	11.2%	84%	13%
Group median	—	37%	8.9%	18%	6%

The price

What a price has to assume.

What the price implies

reverse-DCF

Type today's close and see the owner-earnings growth you'd have to believe to justify it, beside what Barnes & Noble Education Inc has delivered.

Barnes & Noble Education Inc’s latest year runs above its own through-cycle margin — the reported figure may flatter a peak. So the tool opens on the through-cycle base, Graham’s averaging cutting both ways; clear the toggle below to read the latest year exactly as reported.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, Barnes & Noble Education Inc earns about $9M on its 0.6% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 2.2% margin runs above that; the reported figure may flatter a peak you'd be paying on. Normalize, below, values the price on that through-cycle figure rather than the latest year. It comes pre-checked here for that reason, the same rule that already normalizes a trough; clear it to price the year as filed.

Base Normalize · through-cycle ($9M) Net of stock comp (−$6M)

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The assumptions Required return 9% Years of high growth 10 Terminal growth 2.5%

9.0% = the 4.55% 10-year Treasury (Jul 15, 2026) + 4.45 points of equity premium. The rate you require is yours to set.

Enter a price above to run it.

Implied by the price—

Owner-earnings growth, delivered—

Owner-earnings yield—

P/E (3-yr earnings ’24–’26)—

P/B—

Graham’s price gate—

Graham capped the multiple at 15×; Buffett and Munger let that rule go: a wonderful business can deserve 50× if the thesis holds. The gate marks the bargain-hunter's floor.

Against a high-grade bond: Graham’s yardstick bond yield%

Prefilled with the 10-year Treasury (4.55%, as of Jul 15, 2026). Edit it for today’s exact figure, or a AAA corporate yield.

Graham measured a stock against the bond you could own instead, the heart of his margin of safety. Enter a price above to weigh the owner-earnings yield against this bond.

Owner earnings $34M on 35M shares outstanding, per the 10-K cover, as of 2026-07-03; net debt $213M. The base opens on the through-cycle figure (the latest year sits above the record’s own median, and Graham’s averaging cuts both ways); clear Normalize to use the year as filed. Net of stock comp treats option pay as the expense it is. The dials set the multiple a growth belief justifies; the price, and every dollar on this page, is yours.

Weigh BNED against another business →

Cite: Owner Scorecard, "Barnes & Noble Education Inc (BNED), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/BNED, data as of 2026-07-09.

Manual order: ← BMY its page in the Manual BNL →

Industry order: ← BLDR the Specialty Retail chapter BOOT →