Looking to reach consumers beyond its own chain for its proprietary publishing program, Books-A-Million has signed a distribution agreement with Independent Publishers Group. Last month, IPG began distributing six board books from BAM's Sweetwater Press imprint. The books, from Lourdes M. Alvarez's My First Book series, are available in both English and Spanish and cover basic topics such as Numbers, Colors and Shapes. BAM executive v-p Terry Finley declined to comment on any further distribution plans for the press.