Archives for January 2005

New Generation for AMP; New Exec for Regan; And More Andrews McMeel Publishing has announced that as of the end of the year, longtime president and CEO Thomas Thornton will retire from that post — which he has held since 1987 — to be succeeded by scion Hugh T. Andrews (son of co-founder Jim Andrews and parent company Andrews McMeel Universal vice chairman Kathleen Andrews). Andrews, who has been vp of sales and marketing at the company, will remain evp of Andrews McMeel Universal. As part of the transition, on July 1 Andrews will take the titles of president and […]

No Change for Penguin Authors Here’s a shocker: in their follow-up meeting with authors’ representatives, Penguin UK “has rejected demands from some of Britain’s best-known authors for compensation after sales of their books were hit by a distribution crisis,” the Independent reports. Penguin argued that 2004 sales figures were solid; thus “it said that authors as a whole would therefore not be offered recompense but it would consider individual cases from writers who believe they had been particularly affected.” Independent Booker to Try It NBA-Style? While American awards covet the influence of British prizes like the Booker, Booker organizers are […]

Penguin Still Suffers In a preliminary market update in advance of their end-of-February reporting of earnings, Pearson advised that the Penguin Group still “suffered as tough trading conditions persisted through the holiday season, particularly in U.S. mass market and backlist titles.” Pearson expects earnings per share for the year to come in at the low end of forecasts, with the strong pound continuing to take its toll on the company’s significant US sales. Separately, we noticed this curiously underplayed note in the most recent issue of The Bookseller: “Penguin will not fulfill orders from its Rugby depot from 30th january […]

Random House Set to Start Indian Division Continuing their program of international expansion, Random House will launch a division based in India shortly. (Bertelsmann CEO Gunther Thielen had indicated interest in setting up an “entity, wholly owned or otherwise, in India that would look after all our business interests,” last February.) International director Simon Littlewood says, “Our sales in this market have been steadily growing. We feel it’s time to publish books by Indian authors specifically for the Indian market.” He adds, “We will focus on non-fiction as we believe there is as burgeoning market in the area of self-help […]

Please Note The weekly deals will still go out on Sunday night, but there will be no Lunch on Monday. Borders Names Children’s Winners; Editor and Store Owner on MWA List For reasons we don’t entirely understand, Borders is trickling out the naming of their Original Voices award-winners. Yesterday they named Mo Willems’ KNUFFLE BUNNY as their top picture book, and Katherine Hannigan’s IDA B. took the honors for young adult novel. Borders chief marketing officer Michael Spinozzi comments in the announcement, “Mo Willems and Katherine Hannigan have created original and engaging works that appeal to young people and adults […]

Good Holiday for Borders, Too In step with recent bulletins from Barnes & Noble and Books-a-Million, Borders has also indicated that holiday sales were stronger than expected — particularly following a weak third quarter. Comparable store sales at the superstores were up 1.4 percent — less than their peers, but still enough to prompt CEO Greg Josefowicz to comment: “Overall, holiday 2004 was a bit better than expected in Borders superstores driven primarily by strength in book sales. This year, we saw sales improve later in the holiday season and those trends have continued, driven in part by gift card […]