Courier’s battered publishing division, comprising Dover Publications, Creative Homeowner, and Research & Education Association, grew slightly in their fiscal first quarter, up $100,000 at $11.6 million. Dover sales rose 18 percent, though Creative Homeowner was down 61 percent, “reflecting continued weakness in store traffic at home centers, the company’s largest sales channel” and the discontinuation of their book distribution services a year ago. The unit’s loss was reduced to $500,000 from $1.9 million a year ago. Overall sales for the quarter were $63.1 million, up 6 percent from a year ago, with improved net income of $2.8 million.Release
Publishers
Pearson Raises Earnings Guidance for the Year
In a trading advisory ahead of their annual earnings report on March 1, Pearson told investors that they expect to show earnings per share growth of “around 10%, ahead of our previous guidance and the current consensus of market expectations (approximately 61 pence per share.) The company says, “Throughout the year, we have benefited from strong growth in US higher education; good profit improvement in US school testing and international education; and the resilience of professional testing and our subscription-based businesses in the FT Group…. In addition, in the fourth quarter we began to see the first signs of trading […]
At Scholastic, Trade Slides As Education Rises
Sales at Scholastic in their second quarter nudged up 1 percent to $660 million, as operating income fell $2.4 million to $105.6 million. Earnings would have been up sharply, except the company took $40 million in mostly non-cash writedowns. There was a $36.3 million charge from their “decision to consolidate supplemental non-fiction and library publishing activities into the children’s book segment” and another $3.8 million charge “related to assets received in connection with the dissolution of a joint venture in the United Kingdom.” Trade book sales fell 4.5 percent, at $49.6 million for the quarter. Their school book clubs showed […]
Wiley Reverses Trend As Sales Grow, and Professional/Trade Rebounds
Wiley reversed three straight quarters of overall declines (and five consecutive quarters of declines in their professional/trade segment) as sales rose 4 percent to $448 million and operating profit (before a one-time charge) rose 7 percent, to $75.3 million. A small one percent drop in their big STM division, at $251 million, was more than made up for by a 14 percent gain in higher ed, at $77 million, and in the the professional/trade line, which rose 9 percent to $120 million. Trade “sales growth was strongest in the US, UK, Germany, and Australia” and major accounts are ordering again […]
Modest Growth At S&S
Simon & Schuster managed to grow both sales and income in their fiscal third quarter, albeit modestly, as sales rose 2 percent to 230.4 million, OIBDA was up 10 percent to $28.4 million, and operating income rose 14 percent of 26.6 million. The sales gain is attributed to “the timing of the release of titles” while the rise in profits was “primarily due to revenue growth, partially offset by higher write-offs of advances for author royalties.” As CEO Carolyn Reidy noted, “we paid for these books in a different environment” and “when sales are down, royalty writeoffs are up–it’s a […]
Even with Ambitious Comp, Lagardere Publishing Still Growing
Lagardere’s publishing unit reported another sales increase for their fiscal third quarter, up 4.5 percent at 684.6 million euros, even though the period is compared against the beginning of the big Stephenie Meyer breakout in July 2008. The company also had to contend with a weakened dollar and a still-weak pound, yet at HBG US, “the pace of sales growth remained very strong through the summer at over 15 percent despite a tough comparative.” Looking forward the company does concede that publishing “faces a particularly challenging fourth-quarter comparative, as the success of the Stephenie Meyer saga drove like-for-like sales growth […]