Book retailer Barnes & Noble has been criticised by the advertising watchdog for running a nationwide campaign for its ebook reader, the Nook, and promptly running out of stock.

Barnes & Noble launched a nationwide press campaign pushing the Nook at a discount, from £79 to £29, alongside the strapline "Fact not Fiction".

The book company made stock of the Nook available to a wide range of UK retailers – including Argos, Asda, John Lewis and Sainsbury's – based on "recent and reliable data on the UK sales levels for e-readers".

However Barnes & Noble wildly underestimated the demand for e-readers in the UK, with one annoyed consumer contacting the Advertising Standards Authority after failing to find a Nook at any one of the nine retail partners highlighted in the advertisement.

Barnes & Noble said it had forecast that the promotion would increase sales by a factor of 10 to 20 times typical levels.

Instead the bargain price produced a rush of 120 times the normal sales rate.

The company, which launched the ad campaign on 24 April, had to instruct its ad agency on 3 May to pull it as stocks by then had dried up.

The ASA criticised Barnes & Noble for not providing "sufficient evidence that their estimate [of sales and stock] was reasonable".

"The [advertising] code stated that promoters must be able to demonstrate that they had made a reasonable estimate of the likely response and that they were capable of meeting it," said the ASA. "We told Barnes & Noble to ensure that when running promotions in future they ensured they made a reasonable estimate of the likely response to the offer."

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