Head to Head Contrast: Brilliant Earth Group (NASDAQ:BRLT) vs. Barnes & Noble Education (NYSE:BNED)

Barnes & Noble Education (NYSE:BNED) and Brilliant Earth Group (NASDAQ:BRLT) are both small-cap consumer discretionary companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, dividends, earnings, profitability, institutional ownership, valuation and risk.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and recommmendations for Barnes & Noble Education and Brilliant Earth Group, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Barnes & Noble Education	1	1	2	0	2.25
Brilliant Earth Group	1	7	0	0	1.88

Barnes & Noble Education presently has a consensus target price of $17.25, suggesting a potential upside of 51.85%. Brilliant Earth Group has a consensus target price of $1.74, suggesting a potential upside of 26.82%. Given Barnes & Noble Education’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities analysts clearly believe Barnes & Noble Education is more favorable than Brilliant Earth Group.

Profitability

This table compares Barnes & Noble Education and Brilliant Earth Group’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Barnes & Noble Education	1.29%	8.77%	2.66%
Brilliant Earth Group	-0.66%	-15.48%	-5.99%

Insider & Institutional Ownership

38.5% of Barnes & Noble Education shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 70.4% of Brilliant Earth Group shares are held by institutional investors. 1.7% of Barnes & Noble Education shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 83.2% of Brilliant Earth Group shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Risk & Volatility

Barnes & Noble Education has a beta of 1.27, meaning that its stock price is 27% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Brilliant Earth Group has a beta of 1.42, meaning that its stock price is 42% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Barnes & Noble Education and Brilliant Earth Group”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Barnes & Noble Education	$1.71 billion	0.23	$16.87 million	$0.64	17.75
Brilliant Earth Group	$437.48 million	0.32	-$3.63 million	($0.29)	-4.72

Barnes & Noble Education has higher revenue and earnings than Brilliant Earth Group. Brilliant Earth Group is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Barnes & Noble Education, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

Barnes & Noble Education beats Brilliant Earth Group on 10 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Barnes & Noble Education

Barnes and Noble Education, Inc. engages in the management and operation of bookstore chains in universities. It operates through the Retail and Wholesale segments. The Retail segment operates college, university, and K-12 school bookstores, physical bookstores, and virtual bookstores. The Wholesale segment sells and distributes new and used textbooks to physical bookstores. The company was founded by Leonard S, Riggio in 1965 and is headquartered in Basking Ridge, NJ.

About Brilliant Earth Group

Brilliant Earth Group, Inc. designs, procures, and sells diamonds, gemstones, and jewelry in the United States and internationally. The company’s product assortment and merchandise include a collection of diamond engagement rings, wedding and anniversary rings, gemstone rings, and fine jewelry. It sells directly to consumers through its omnichannel sales platform, including e-commerce and showrooms. Brilliant Earth Group, Inc. was founded in 2005 and is headquartered in San Francisco, California.