Down Quarter For BAM!

The combination of a 7.7% drop in comparable store sales and the closing of 21 underperforming stores led to an 8.1% decline in sales, to $94.4 million, at Books-A-Million in the third quarter ended October 29. The bookstore chain also took one-time costs of $3.8 million related to the store closings as well as to the opening of 41 new BAM! stores this month. BAM! reported a loss of $4.0 million in the most recent period, up from a $1.7 million loss in last year’s third quarter.

Hastings Results Fall; Opens E-bookstore

A weak slate of new offerings across the book, movie, and video game businesses as well as the continuing move to e-book sales from print books led to a loss of $5.5 million at Hastings Entertainment in the third quarter ended October 31, compared to a loss of $3.1 million in last year’s third quarter. Sales fell 3.3% in the quarter, to $108.6 million. To compete more effectively, Hastings launched an e-bookstore November 10 at gohastings.com and on November 20 began offering the Nextbook Premium 7 tablet for sale in its stores.

Amazon Launches Branded DC Comics Storefront

DC Comics is teaming with Amazon.com to launch a branded store on the online retailer that will feature print and digital editions of DC Comics’ graphic novels. The new DC Comics store will feature the 100 digital graphic novel collections DC is selling exclusively via the newly released Amazon Kindle Fire as well as DC print collections.

Kane Miller, Demibooks Team Up

Demibooks has partnered with publisher Kane Miller to form a new children’s book imprint called InkPad Press. InkPad, which plans approximately 20 titles per year, with a focus on picture books, will release titles in print, while also allowing authors to use Demibooks’ Composer platform, a software program for creating digitally enhanced versions of books.

‘Cabin Fever’ Tops One Million Sold

Hardcover sales of Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Cabin Fever, the sixth book in Jeff Kinney’s blockbuster series, topped one million copies in its first week on sale, publisher Abrams reported.