Sales at Canada’s dominant bookseller Indigo rose 1.6 percent in the first quarter at $193.6 million (Canadian), with same-store superstore sales up 1.4 percent and same-store sales at their smaller-format stores up 0.8 percent. Online sales continue to decline, though, down 9.1 percent to $19.1 million, and the company says they have “eliminated certain non profitable business.” Their net loss was worse, at $2.3 million compared to a $1.2 million loss a year ago. CEO Heather Reisman says the “drop in bottom line results reflects our increased operating investment this year in both Pistachio and Shortcovers.” (Pistacho is “an eco-friendly […]
Bookstores
Bookselling: Children's Store to Close; Store Hit By Truck Reopens; Biography Bookshop Moves
Chicago-area children’s store Crocodile Pie will close after being rescued once by new owners a year ago. Co-owner Amy Moran says: “People either don’t have the money to spend or they’re being cautious – and rightfully so. We have a great client base – people have been very supportive. But they just don’t have the funds that they spent before.” But Flintridge Bookstore, the Pasadena, CA store that was substantially damaged after a tractor-trailer crashed into its building four months, will have a grand reopening this weekend. In New York, the West Village’s Biography Bookshop has been driven from its […]
Bookselling Bits
Atlanta’s A Cappella Books is planning a midnight opening event for the release of Thomas Pynchon’s Inherent Vice. In London, independent bookseller Crockatt and Powell is closing their South London store, after shuttering their Fulham Road branch in June. Stretching to try that second branch is what weakened the operation, co-owner Matthew Crockatt tells the Bookseller: “We made a commercial decision that didn’t turn out to be a good one.” And in electronic bookselling, Sony has announced that they now have over 1 million public domain titles available on their Reader.
Bookselling: Free BN Wi-fi; Google Previews at Diesel; Ulin on Amazon; Blogging Reps Interviewed
Years late to the party but still interesting, Barnes & Noble announced this morning that they will provide free in-store wi-fi. (The bookselling chain has provided paid wi-fi service from AT&T ever since that company took over Wayport. AT&T continues as their provider–and is also the provider selected by Plastic Logic for their ereader.) Clearly one part of the strategy is to help promote their new ebookstore and link the physical stores to sales of ebooks: “All customers shopping in Barnes & Noble stores can now freely download and preview any of the over 700,000 eBook titles with hundreds of […]
Bookselling: Target Is Timesworthy
Target’s ability to select and sell titles to its customers that may not be major bestsellers in traditional bookstores is the focus of an NYT feature, which says their Bookmarket club “has highlighted largely unknown writers.” Their picks are focused on trade paperback fiction, and include special designations such as a recent “Hand-Picked Titles From Emerging Authors.” Among the successful picks, which can sell 50,000 to 150,000 copies at Target alone, have been Michelle Richmond’s The Year of Fog, Meg Waite Clayton’s The Wednesday Sisters, Lisa Genova’s Still Alice, Diane Chamberlain’s The Secret Life of CeeCee Wilkes, and Tatiana de […]
It's Ready: Barnes & Noble Launches eBookstore, Partners with Plastic Logic
BN launched their anticipated ebookstore yesterday, offering approximately 200,000 real titles along with 500,000 free public domain titles from Google, “including hundreds of new releases and bestsellers at only $9.99.” The NYT says they define new releases as “a new e-book for the first six months of its availability.” In a conference call (to which we weren’t invited) the company promised to add another 300,000 titles or so within the next year. They are claiming in the release to have the “world’s largest ebookstore,” though Cool-er made that claim earlier in the year as well and asserted 750,000 titles (while […]