Fourth quarter sales at Books-A-Million fell 6 percent on a same-store basis and 4.6 percent overall at $157 million, but net income of $11.9 million was up more than 6 percent. For the full year sales of $509 million were down 1.3 percent, declining 3.8 on a same-store basis, and net income rose to $13.8 million. The board authorized another stock repurchasing program of up $5 million.
Bookstores
Anonymous Official Says Canada Is "Leaning" Towards Approving Amazon's Expansion Plan
The Canadian Booksellers’ Association has urged the country’s government to reject Amazon’s application to operate their own Canadian-based warehouse and fulfillment operation. But an article in the Globe and Mail quotes an unnamed senior official who indicates the Harper administration is “leaning towards” approving Amazon’s plan, believing there is a “net benefit” to Canadians. That person added, “If you look at the issue specifically, it’s Amazon setting up a warehouse to be able to distribute what they already distribute via the Internet. There’s no change in terms of Canadian content.” Part of the booksellers’ argument is that “individual Canadian booksellers […]
More Layoffs at Borders' Stores
Last week Borders is said to have eliminated more jobs across its stores, according to numerous anonymous employee posts on a company forum, though the retailer has not made any official public announcement of reductions. Many individual posts have been made by people who held training supervisor and inventory supervisor positions who say they werelet go. This quote is said to be taken from an internal announcement: “We made the decision to eliminate the training supervisor position so that we could allocate more hours to the sales floor. Training remains an important function in our stores, and the responsibilities of […]
Today's eNews
Engadget featured “exclusive” pictures of Microsoft’s Courier, a tablet/ereader–now called a “digital journal–that the company is working on.Link Amazon is said to have e-mailed its Colorado-based affiliates to notify them that their relationship with the etailer has been severed as of March 8 as the result of new state legistation “to impose sales tax regulations on online retailers.” The company writes: “The new regulations do not require online retailers to collect sales tax. Instead, they are clearly intended to increase the compliance burden to a point where online retailers will be induced to ‘voluntarily’ collect Colorado sales tax — a […]
Amazon's Canadian Play Is to Open their Own Distribution Center
The Globe and Mail has further information on Amazon’s application to Canada’s government, seeking permission to open their own distribution center within the country. The etailer currently dispatches its Canadian shipments through a unit of Canada Post. HMV Canada president Humphrey Kadaner says, “This would bring Amazon into competition with pretty much every retailer in Canada, assuming they expand their product offering as they have in the States. They really would become much more of a general retailer.” Indigo ceo Heather Reisman says, “This is evolution…. It just needs to be transparent and evenly applied.” She has written to the […]
Borders Reportedly Looking to Extend Credit Agreement
The folks at Debtwire–the same outfit, we should remember, that misreported a story earlier this year contending that some vendors had retained counsel to collect monies owed to them by Borders–has filed another long story, carried on the FT web site, about Borders’ credit issues. Close watchers of the company know that there have been two significant liquidity deadlines: their $42.5 million loan from principal owner Pershing Square is due April 1, and the revolving credit agreement that allows them to conduct business expires in July 2011. Getting that credit line renewed in today’s world of restricted lending, particularly since […]