Archives for May 2006

Schedule Note I’m traveling to DC in the morning and speaking at the Writers Conference at BEA, so Lunch won’t be served until after mealtime tomorrow. From Thursday through Saturday, we will publish at least once a day though the timing is never clear — last thing or first thing are your two best bets. As before, we’ll post regularly to the PublishersMarketplace.com home page and our related special BEA pages there as frequently as we can during the show. Personnel News Former Dorling Kindersley publisher Christopher Davis is joining Weldon Owen as publisher-at-large, charged with helping to “grow its […]

Oxford Combines Divisions, AMS’s Hire, and More Personnel News In an announcement made to staff on Friday, Oxford University Press is combining the trade and academic divisions in the US, with trade publisher Ellen Chadosh, evp and COO Barbara Wasserman, and director of sales Michael Burken all leaving the company as a result. The newly combined unit will be under the direction of publisher Niko Pfund. PFund comments, “The new structure and the new investment in publishing announced today are intended to increase our effectiveness as a publisher in both the trade and academic markets. It is a plan for […]

Monday, May 14 Our Usual Reminder If for some reason this has reached you even though you are not a paying member of PublishersMarketplace, please visit the link below to join us all the time for complete deal reports and more. Click to register http://www.publishersmarketplace.com/register.shtml Deal Reports Just e-mail to deals@PublishersMarketplace if you aren’t using the online form linked below. Report a deal using the online form The Key As usual, the handy key to our Lunch deal categories. While all reports are always welcome, those that include a category will generally receive a higher listing when it comes time […]

B&T Passes from One Private Equity Group to Another Willis Stein announced that they are selling Baker & Taylor to yet another private equity group, Castle Harlan, for $455 million. Castle Harlan vice chairman Gary Appel says in the announcement, “The experienced management team led by Richard Willis, president and chief executive officer, that has directed its growth will continue to manage the business as our partners, and senior management will continue to retain an ownership stake in the company.” When Willis Stein bought the company just under three years ago, they paid $255 million, and B&T was bringing in […]

Reed Gives In — And Screws Frankfurt? LBF to Earl’s Court Just days after Reed Exhibitions UK chief Alastair Gornall explained why Earl’s Court was a bad venue for a book fair and urged the trade to trot out to Excel one more time, the organizers of the London Book Fair have done a complete turnaround — and apparently have screwed the folks at the Frankfurt Book Fair who inspired the change in the first place. The established show has signed a “long-term management agreement” to run a book fair on the exact same dates chosen by FBF, April 16 […]

Cody’s Original Store to Close Citing “ruinous losses” of over $1 million, owner Andy Ross has announced the closing of Cody’s Books’ well-known store on Telegraph Avenue, near the University of California at Berkeley. Ross says the store has run in the red for the past 15 years. Cody’s smaller outlet in Berkeley and their large store in downtown San Francisco will remain open. SF Chron New Fair in London: No Longer Priceless As promised in our report from Monday, FBF officials have launched a starting web site for their Book Fair in London, which lists basic prices (and advance […]