Sales dropped $2 million (or 1.9 percent) at Books-A-Million in their fiscal first quarter, ending May 2, reaching $101.8 million for the period. Same-store sales also declined 0.9 percent down 2.5 percent, and the net loss of $5.3 million was marginally improved over the $5.6 million net loss for the same time period last year. Even ceo Terrance Finley couldn’t quite issue an upbeat statement, commenting: “Our comparable store sales decline versus last year was largely due to a strong prior year title lineup in our teen category. This decline was moderated by improvements in our fiction and kids categories […]
Archives for May 2015
People, Etc.
At HarperCollins Christian Books, Stephanie Newton has been promoted to marketing director, backlist, as part of an expanded focus on backlist titles at the company. Claire Ivett has been promoted to associate editor at Da Capo Lifelong Books. In Canada, Steve Osgoode has joined Joe Books as president. Previously he was director, digital products at HarperCollins Canada. Awards At an awards ceremony for the Audie Awards Thursday night, Mandela: An Audio History by Radio Diaries; narrated by Desmond Tutu, Nelson Mandela, and Joe Richman (Highbridge) won the audiobook of the year award. The complete list of winners is here. Distribution […]
James Patterson Launches New Children’s Imprint
James Patterson will launch a new dedicated children’s imprint, jimmy patterson, at longtime publisher Little, Brown, that will release eight to 12 middle-grade and young adult titles annually (4-6 of those titles will be Patterson’s, with the other acquisitions to be overseen by him.) “We’re not going to buy a lot of books, but if we buy them, we’re going to publish them with gusto,” Patterson told the NYT in advance of the official announcement at BEA Friday morning. Proceeds from the imprint’s titles will go to scholarships for teachers; helping bookstores; supporting school libraries; increasing the reach of Patterson’s […]
At ABA Annual Keynote, Teicher Points to “Impressive Resurgence” of Indie Bookselling
At the ABA’s annual general meeting, ceo Oren Teicher called attention to independent bookstores’ “impressive resurgence” and the association’s expanding initiatives over the past twelve months. Teicher called attention to “significant investment in technology, especially for IndieCommerce”; an expansion of Winter Institute as well as the Children’s Institute; the “successful debut” of Independent Bookstore Day; and the Indies First and Indies Introduce program. “Though we are not there yet, we are making progress on decoupling ‘endangered’ from indie bookstore!” As reported earlier in the week, ABA members now operate more than 2200 bookstores, with increased sales for 47 of 52 […]
BEA, Day One: View From The Floor, Rooftop, Stage
There’s a danger in ascribing a general mood to a trade show after a single day (never mind that publications do it all the time, and will do so in the future) but the words that come to my mind are “pleasantly discombobulating.” The wifi was free and worked, for the most part (we’ll see about that today.) The show floor, an hour or so after opening at the later-than-usual 1 PM time, was full of people but nowhere near capacity. Members of the delegation from China seemed as content to mingle as they did to take pictures of the […]
Briefs: HarperCollins Adds Titles to Shazam; Sierra Club Closes Book Imprints; and More
HarperCollins will be the exclusive global book partner for the launch of music recognition app Shazam‘s new visual recognition functionality. (Other newspaper and magazine partners include Condé Nast, Esquire, Time and the Wall Street Journal.) Starting immediately whenever Shazam users wave their mobile phone over any HarperCollins book or promotional content with the Shazam camera logo on it, they will instantly get taken to custom mobile experiences from HarperCollins, including exclusive content, author interviews, special offers, videos, playlists and more. Available and forthcoming titles in the program include Harper Lee’s Go Set A Watchman; Welcome to Night Vale by Joseph […]