The Random House Publishing Group has joined HarperCollins in working with InstaFreebie to promote pre-publication book excerpts. (Harper acquired The Midlist, a deals email newsletter run by InstaFreebie’s parent company, last October.) InstaFreebie currently reaches approximately 300,000 consumers and delivers excerpts via email, providing optional social DRM — which RHPG is using on their excerpts. As ceo Jason Freeman notes in the release, “Readers who receive advanced access will frequently buy, review, and/or recommend the book.” For RHPG, in addition to the direction promotional value, the relationship is part of their larger initiative to build up their consumer email lists by millions of […]
Bookstores
Hastings to Liquidate Between Now and October 31
Per our previous reports, the stalking horse bid from liquidators Hilco and Gordon Brothers has prevailed, and it appears that no other offers were made at Wednesday’s scheduled auction. While the plan requires final acceptance by the Bankruptcy Court on Friday, complete documents for a “notice of successful bidder and agency agreement” were filed last night. Once approved, the liquidation sale will begin immediately, and continue through October 31 at the latest, with all Hastings stores to be closed. (Locations can be closed earlier than that on a store-by-store basis, with seven days notice to the employees.) As we indicated […]
Liquidators Approved As Hastings Stalking Horse Bidder
At a hearing on Monday afternoon, a Delaware Bankruptcy Court judge approved the stalking horse bid for the inventory of Hastings Entertainment from liquidators Gordon Brothers and Hilco that we reported on last Friday. Per that earlier report, the bid “provides for a guaranteed payment of 75 percent of the cost of the debtors’ inventory which is based on in excess of $110 million of inventory and should provide more than $82 million in proceeds.” The bidders were granted the bid protections that they sought from the court, including fees and expenses if their offer does not prevail, along with a requirement that any […]
Potential Stalking Horse Bid Has Hastings On Likely Path to Liquidation
With a potential auction — if there are any bidders — scheduled for July 20, a number of motions have been filed in which Hasting Entertainment is trying to secure a stalking horse bid. After filing for bankruptcy protection just over a month ago, the distressed entertainment retailer looks to be headed for liquidation rather than reorganization, however, since the prospective bid is from liquidators Hilco and Gordon Brothers. In its current form, that bid would just cover the secured lenders, and leave little or nothing for unsecured trade creditors, including many publishers. The proposed stalking horse bid “provides for […]
People, Etc.
At Ecco, Sara Wood has been promoted to associate art director. Andrea Cascardi will rejoin Transatlantic Agency as a literary agent based out of New York. Previously she was managing director of Egmont USA from 2013 to 2015, and before then spent ten years as an agent at TLA. Jennifer Metzger has joined Insight Editions as sales manager. Bookselling Anne Hollander answered the open call from Deep Vellum Publishing head Will Evans and will join him as co-founder of the Deep Vellum Books bookstore in Dallas. The store is expected to set an official grand opening shortly. Alliance Scholastic has a multi-year licensing […]
Bookselling: BN Fires “Under 50” IT People, Portland’s New Indie, and More
Even as Barnes & Noble continues to promise fixes to their botched website relaunch, the company is laying off what spokesperson Mary Ellen Keating called “less than 50 people” at their Westbury, Long Island IT office. Keating wrote to Newsday, “We have a very large IT department in Westbury that supports our stores and financial teams. We had some workforce reductions in specific areas of our IT Group in Westbury to streamline operations.” That facility apparently receives discounted electricity “under the state Power Authority’s ReCharge NY program, which is intended to retain jobs in the state.” Separately, Longtime booksellers Emily Russo and Josh Christie […]