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Hub City Writer's Project Hums Along
In May 1995, journalist Betsy Teter and two other ambitious Spartanburg, S.C., writers had the idea to publish an anthology about their home, a blue-collar/college town of 40,000, as a first step toward establishing a literary community to help preserve the evolving city's sense of place and history.
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CAMEX 2011: Moving Beyond the Book
College stores may have taken the word "book" out of their name, but they still have a lot in common with their independent bookstore brethren. At this year's 88th annual meeting of the National Association of College Stores and Campus Market Expo many concerns shared with ABA stores, such as online competition and declining print sales, were evident.
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Court Rejects Burkle Appeal
The Delaware Supreme Court has rejected an appeal by Ron Burkle in a lawsuit challenging a poison pill plan adopted by Barnes & Noble. Burkle filed the original suit this summer after B&N instituted the poison pill provision in response to Burkle significantly increasing his stake in the retailer. A judge last year upheld the provision, prompting Burkle's appeal.
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Skylight Books in Raffle Promotion
In a bid to boost book sales, Skylight Books in Los Angeles is giving away raffle tickets for signed limited edition prints by artist Dan Clowes (Ghost World, etc.) to any customer that spends more than $40 on books during the month of March.
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Puchner, Skloot Among B&N 2010 Discover Award Winners
Kim Echlin and David R. Dow have won Barnes & Noble's 2010 Discover Awards, for fiction and nonfiction. Echlin, who is from Canada, won the fiction award for The Disappeared (Black Cat), and Dow, a lawyer, won the non-fiction award for The Autobiography of an Execution (Twelve). With the honor, Echlin and Dow each receives a cash prize of $10,000, along with a year of marketing support for their books from B&N.
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CAMEX Puts the Emphasis on Digital
Change was the theme of this year's 88th annual National Association of College Stores meeting and Campus Market Expo at the George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston, which ended Tuesday. "If we don't change, we will not be viable. It needs to be significant change in a significant way," said Donald "Buz" Moser, executive director of business services for Wake Forest University Stores in Winston-Salem, N.C. Nowhere is change more evident than the NACS's digital initiative.
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Bloomsbury USA Has Best Year
Bloomsbury USA had its best year ever in 2010 with profits up 160% to 1.3 million pounds ($2.1million) before central charges of 200,000 pounds. Sales rose 1.6% to 19.1 million pounds ($31 million). Sales were led by The Finkler Question, backlist sales, three children’s bestsellers, right sales and e-books. E-book sales totaled $2.3 million for all of Bloomsbury with two-thirds of that coming from the U.S. In the first month Finkler was on sale in the U.S., 42% of sales were from e-books.
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Random House Switches to Agency Model For E-book Sales
Random House, Inc., the last of the big six houses still using the wholesale model for e-book sales, announced plans to adopt the agency model effective March 1 and the company has begun implementing the switch with accounts today. A Random House spokesperson said the company is making the change now because it is the right time. The adoption of the agency model is "part commercial motivation for our customers; part investment in their digital sales growth and ours; part ensuring our authors that their e-books will be even more widely available anywhere anytime," the spokesperson said.
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Distribution: Cadence at Five, Whitehurst & Clark Hits 75
Despite the economy, the Cadence Group in Cohoes, N.Y., which offers distribution as well as a la carte marketing, sales, and packaging services to small and start-up publishers, has doubled its business since last summer. This year book fulfillment house Whitehurst & Clark Book Fulfillment in Flemington, N.J., hit a different goal and added its 75th client, the Primary Research Group in New York City.
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B&N Looks for the Right Print, Digital Balance
Barnes & Noble's third-quarter results for the period ended January 29 shows the dilemma faced by companies making the transition from print to digital. In the case of B&N, while its fastest growth is tied to the sale of e-books and Nook digital readers, its most profitable business remains its bookstores.
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A World with Fewer Borders
As the bookstore chains grew in the 1980s and ‘90s, the number of independent booksellers fell dramatically, but those that survived expect little pop from the impending closing of 200 Borders stores as part of the retailer's bankruptcy reorganization.
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Ingram Expands Gift, Game Inventory
Encouraged by the response it received from its Christian bookselling accounts to its expanded selection of gifts, the Ingram Content Group is adding to the number of gifts and games it is stocking for the general bookstore market.
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NACS to Partner with BookRenter
On the eve of the opening of the 2011 Campus Market Expo in Houston, Tex., the National Association of College Stores announced that it will partner with online textbook giant, BookRenter (www.BookRenter.com). Through NACSCORP, the association’s wholesale distributor subsidiary, NACS will offer three BookRenter services to its 3,100 member college stores. The services are aimed at increasing both foot traffic and textbook revenue by enabling students to shop on their local campuses and save money.
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Four Pubs Named to Borders's Creditors Committee
The official committee of unsecured creditors involved with Borders Group's Chapter 11 filing was approved Thursday afternoon with representatives from Penguin, HarperCollins, Random House and Perseus Books Group appointed.
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Mysterious Galaxy Will Expand to Second Location
Mysterious Galaxy, a mystery and science fiction bookstore that has operated in San Diego since 1993, will open a second store this summer in Redondo Beach, Calif. The new location will replicate the original store's genres, which also include fantasy, horror, and urban fantasy, but in addition will offer a wider selection of books outside those areas.
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'Writer's Digest' to Sponsor Webinar on Borders Bankruptcy and Writers
F+W Media, publisher of the Writer's Digest, is sponsoring a free webinar on the Borders bankruptcy and how it will affect writers. "The Borders Dilemma: What the New World Order of Bookselling Means for Writers," a 60-minute webinar, will be held at 1 p.m. on Friday, February 25.
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Finalists Named for 'PW' Awards
Publishers Weekly named four finalists for the 19th annual PW Bookstore and PW Rep of the Year Awards to be given in a special ceremony at BookExpo America in May. The award winners will also receive a write-up in the pre-BEA issue of PW’s print magazine in late April. A slate of judges comprised of industry representatives and last year’s award winners will determine the 2011 award winners.
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Barnes & Noble Sales Jump Led By Digital Products
Lots of headlines in Barnes & Noble’s release of its third quarter results for the period ended January 29, its first extended remarks since Borders filed for Chapter 11 last week.
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Page One Hopes to Keeping Going After Filing for Chapter 11
With a lot less fanfare than a similar statement from Borders Group last week, Page One Bookstore in Albuquerque filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on February 8 in U.S. Bankruptcy Court, District of New Mexico.
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