Barnes & Noble reported a not-terrible nine-week holiday sales period: Total sales at the division comprising the BN stores and BN.com were basically flat at $1.1 billion (up 0.2 percent), though that result was helped by “favorable timing of the fiscal nine-week period, which ended on January 3 this year as compared to December 28 last year,” which made up for some of the sales lost due to store closures. Sales would have been down 1.6 percent absent the schedule gain. Bookstore comp sales declined 0.6 percent because of Nook declines; “core” store sales, leaving aside Nook devices and accessories, rose […]
Earnings Reports
UK Booksellers Report Good Holiday Sales (And Low Kindle eReader Sales)
Two UK bookstore chains reported encouraging holiday sales. Waterstones says print book sales were up 5 percent in December, and Foyles said same-store book sales were up 11 percent for the holiday. With 290 stores, Waterstones now expects to open a dozen or more new stores during 2015. Both booksellers also reported weak sales for ereading devices — which should hardly be a surprise, as most consumers have moved on tablets and ereading loyalists are most likely to buy directly from their platform of choice rather than stumbling on devices through a third party. Waterstones said Kindle device sales “disappeared to […]
Briefs
Following Macmillan ceo John Sargent’s indication that they will, with some reluctance, “test subscription in the coming weeks,” Oyster announced that their collection now includes over 1,000 titles published by Bloomsbury. Harper UK has disclosed their annual results for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2014. Sales fell to £179 million, down £11 million from the prior year, while profits rebounded from terrible to just low, with pre-tax earnings of £7.2 million (still, much better than £2.8 million the year before). The company said profits were held down by £3.5 million related to their planned relocation to new offices in 2015. The Bookseller […]
School Book Clubs Help Lift Second Quarter Sales At Scholastic
Scholastic reported second quarter sales of $666 million, up 7 percent (or $43 million) from a year ago, “largely driven by strong sales in children’s books, especially in the company’s school-based distribution channels, and continued growth in classroom books and magazines.” All of the growth and more came from the children’s book publishing and distribution division, which rose $50.5 million to $403 million. Trade sales were up $3.1 million to $55.6 million, helped by the Minecraft series. School Book Club sales rose $32.2 million, or 33 percent, to $129.6 million. “Lower investment in Storia” helped children’s book publishing profits. The […]
Sales Drop 18 Percent at Faber In “Tough” Market for UK Indies
2013 was a rough year for many UK independents, leading to the sale of Quercus to Little Brown UK, the reorganization of Atlantic Books (with Allen and Unwin taking a majority stake) and the sale of some of Osprey Publishing’s lines, to cite a few examples. Similarly, Faber and Faber has now announced results for the fiscal year ending March 2014, with sales falling 18 percent to £16.26 million and earnings swinging from more than £2 million in the previous year (when Faber had “record results”) to a small loss of £5,000. And the company says “market conditions have continued […]
Wiley Gains, Even As Book Sales Fall
Wiley announced second quarter results Tuesday morning, with sales of $477 million up $28 million from a year ago, a 6 percent gain. Adjusted earnings per share grew more, up 8 percent, to $54 million, or 90 cents a share. Book sales declined across their major segments, however. In the professional development segment, combined print and ebook sales were down 9 percent in the quarter to $67 million; in the education segment, book sales were down 7 percent to $50 million; and in research, books and references declined 9 percent to $37 million. CEO Steve Smith says in the release, […]