The Community Bookstore in Cobble Hill (not to be confused with Community Bookstore in Park Slope) is set to close in 2016 after owner John Scioli agreed to sell the three-story building that houses the bookstore on the ground floor for $5.5 million to a real estate group that owns several buildings in midtown. Scioli has 10 months to clear out the bookstore, where between 60,000 and 100,000 titles are stocked from floor to ceiling, and two years to move out of his apartment upstairs. “I’ll be the first to admit I’m a bit of a hoarder,” Scioli, who has operated the bookstore […]
Bookstores
After Education Spinoff, Barnes & Noble Will Reinstate Dividend
Barnes & Noble announced a final date for the BN Education spinoff — distributing the new stock on August 2 (to BN shareholders of record as of July 27). BNED stock is expected to begin trading on a “when-issued” basis starting July 23 and will convert to regular trading on August 3. More importantly to investors and those concerned with the financial health of Barnes & Noble Inc., the company announced that it will resume paying quarterly dividends after the spinoff. They will pay at the annual rate of 60 cents a share, with the first quarterly record date of August 7. The bookseller had […]
Andersons Get “Definitive Agreement” to Buyout Books-A-Million For $21 Million
Six months after their latest offer to take Books-A-Million private, the controlling Anderson family has reached a deal to buyout shareholders of the country’s second-largest book retailer for approximately $21 million, an improved offer of $3.25 a share. (Previously, they offered $17 million, or $2.75 a share.) Unanimously approved by a special board committee and the directors, the deal offers a 23 percent premium over Monday’s closing trading price of $2.60 a share. A majority of the shareholders outside of the family still need to approve the deal for it to go through. The Andersons currently own just under 58 percent of shares. They […]
BN Marketplace Comes Back Online
When Barnes & Noble went live with the revamped version of their website on June 30, there were a number of bumps, including some periods of downtime. But the biggest missing element was their Marketplace, which offers “access to tens of millions of items provided by” third-party sellers, including used books. On Tuesday night BN spokesperson Mary Ellen Keating confirmed to eCommerceBytes, “We recently launched our bn.com website without Marketplace going live. Our plan is to have Marketplace back up and live tomorrow.” Keating reiterated to PL that Marketplace was due to be live by or prior to 6:00 PM Wednesday evening, and indeed that […]
McLain’s Circling the Sun Tops August Indie Next List
Circling the Sun by Paula McLain is the ABA’s No. 1 Indie Next pick for August. The rest of the list also includes Kitchens of the Great Midwest by J. Ryan Stradal and The Marriage of Opposites, by Alice Hoffman, both featured in our Spring/Summer Buzz Books 2015 ebook, as well as: Fishbowl, by Bradley Somer Armada, by Ernest Cline The Girl Who Slept with God, by Val Brelinski You’re Never Weird on the Internet (Almost), by Felicia Day Barefoot to Avalon: A Brother’s Story, by David Payne Dragonfish, by Vu Tran Orphan #8, by Kim van Alkemade Mrs. Sinclair’s Suitcase, […]
Bookselling: Amazon Expands in Mexico; Indigo Expands Store Discounts; and More
Two years after launching its Kindle store in Mexico, Amazon has expanded to offer a broad spectrum of physical goods, including printed books, at http://amazon.com.mx/. Offerings include the three versions of the Kindle e-reader. Indigo will now discount 100 top-selling and bookseller-recommend books by 40 percent, ceo Heather Reisman tells the Globe & Mail, “looking for some way to bring a little bit of added value to the overall experience” while noting that if the retailer “had to sell books at online prices, Indigo could not continue to exist.” (Indigo discounts titles by up to 50 percent online.) Previously, they deep discounted […]