Amazon ceo Jeff Bezos wrote his annual letter to shareholders and, as with last year’s letter, he focuses on the trinity (or “three big pillars”) of Prime, Marketplace, and AWS. (The last time he mentioned readers or Kindle was two years ago.) Prime membership grew 47 percent growth in the US last year and counts “tens of millions of members worldwide.” And “close to 50 percent of units sold on Amazon are sold by third-party sellers” (which includes publishers who sell ebooks on an agency basis). This year’s letter also speaks vaguely at length about “corporate cultures,” following criticism of Amazon’s work environment: “For better or for […]
Earnings Reports
Trade Gains Lift Scholastic’s Sales, on Narrower Seasonal Loss
Scholastic reported fiscal third quarter results on Thursday, with sales up $19.5 million to $366 million, as losses from continuing operations were cut by over half to 21 cents a share, compared to 48 cents a share a year ago. The operating loss of $16.4 million was also well below last year’s deficit this quarter of $24.7 million. (Scholastic typically reports a seasonal loss in the third quarter, which is generally its weakest.) The strong US dollar cost the company $9 million in negative foreign exchange. Fiscal 2016 sales are still projected to be roughly $1.65 billion, but the company reduced earnings guidance […]
Penguin Random House Sales Rise On Currency Boost
Bertelsmann reported 2015 sales on Tuesday morning, with headline results for Penguin Random House showing sales of €3.717 billion — up 393 million — and operating ebitda of €557 million, up €105 million. (Note that we mentioned throughout 2015 that the rising dollar alone could lift PRH’s sales by €350 million to €400 million or more, which was pretty much on target.) Traditionally most of the trade reporting you’ll read on the PRH results comes from the earnings press release, but we turn to the company’s 140-page annual report for more granular detail on the book publisher’s performance. Sales at […]
Quarto’s Sales Rise On Acquisition, As Chadwick Will Exit Board
Quarto reported sales of $182 million for 2015, up $11 million over the previous year, with operating profit of $16 million just above flat. Sales were lifted by the acquisition of Ivy Press early in 2015, which added $8 million in sales. (Quarto paid $1.9 million for Ivy Press in 2015, along with the assumption of $300,000 in debt.) The core publishing groups in the US and UK, along with the co-editions unit, had sales of $145 million, up $17 million for the year, while sales declined almost $8 million at the Books & Gifts Direct business. Looking ahead, the […]
Profits Flat At Lagardere Publishing
Lagardere reported 2015 profits after the close of the market in France, after having reported sales on their own in February. Lagardere Publishing had flat earnings on higher sales, with recurring EBIT of €198 million (up 1 million), and €16 million of charges for nonrecurring items. As previously reported publishing sales were €2.206 billion — up just 1.7 percent on a like-for-like basis, but €202 million euros overall. (Foreign exchange accounted for a big €140 million of those gains, and acquisitions added €28 million.) With the increase in sales, Lagardere Publishing’s operating margin was 9 percent, down form 9.8 percent a year […]
Barnes & Noble Education Gives Up On Yuzu
We’ve been skeptical of Barnes & Noble Education’s digital platform Yuzu since they started it in 2014, ever since we learned that a yuzu “is a hybrid citrus fruit with curiously high ratio of seeds to juice.” In reporting fiscal third quarter results on Tuesday morning, the company finally announced the end of their attempt to turn what didn’t work for Nook into something similar: “In an effort to reduce and manage digital expenditures, while at the same time maintaining high quality digital products,” they said, they are migrating their digital platform to Ingram’s VitalSource. (Not unlike their competitor Chegg, which […]