After more than a decade of waiting, Simon & Schuster Canada has received approval from Heritage Canada to publish local authors directly in Canada, rather than just import and distribute books from the S&S US list. “Simon & Schuster Canada has met its obligations under the Investment Canada Act and may now launch a book publishing business in Canada,” Heritage Canada told the Globe and Mail in an email. President of Simon & Schuster Canada Kevin Hanson said in a statement, “This will give Canadian authors more opportunities to be published in Canada, discovered by Canadian readers and made known […]
International News
Sales, Comps and Earnings Fall at BAM with No Big Hits; Sales and Profits Drop for Indigo
Following the expansion of their store footprint over a year ago, Books-a-Million has returned to sales declines on both an overall as well as a comparable store basis. For their first quarter, ending March 4, overall sales fell 7.4 percent to $104.5 million (down from $112.8 million a year ago), and same-store sales dropped 6.8 percent. As a result, their net loss from continuing operations increased — up to $3.7 million, 25 cents per share, almost double the $1.9 million loss recorded a year ago. CEO Terrance Finley said in the announcement, “Our first quarter results were slightly below our […]
People, Etc.
New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg officially has declared Tuesday as “G.P. Putnam’s Sons Day,” in recognition of the publisher’s 175th anniversary. Bloomberg said: “The story of G.P. Putnam’s Sons has it all – entrepreneurship, determination, romance, big dreams. It is a classic New York City story, and on this wonderful occasion, today, we join Putnam’s extended family and many readers across the world in looking ahead to the next exciting chapter.” Michael Foster, who bought control of the UK agency PFD and merged it with his MF Management in 2010 to form The Rights House, has sold his shares back […]
Another Chance at Frankfurt, As PLC Moves to Tuesday (October 8)
Even before TOC abruptly closed their business, we were already planning to move our Publishers Launch Frankfurt conference to Tuesday, October 8 — the main pre-Frankfurt conference day — after a successful run on the slightly-too-early Monday, so that more FBF attendees can make our event a regular part of their Frankfurt calendar. Last year’s remarkable PLC Frankfurt featured 11 c-level executives from publishers and retailers all over the world and this year’s program will include the same unique, high-level strategic and operational analysis of issues faced by trade publishers globally transitioning to a more digital world. We’ll continue the […]
More on Granta Cost-Cutting, Exodus
The Guardian offers some much-needed details on the growing (and to many, perplexing) exodus at Granta, which began last month with editor John Freeman’s departure, followed swiftly by the resignation of three additional magazine staffers and earlier this week, the exit of Granta Books/Portobello publisher Philip Gwyn Jones, with additional departures possible. In an emailed statement, Freeman said that Granta owner Sigrid Rausing “decided a while back she wanted to run the magazine and books on a very reduced staff” and he “didn’t want to be part of that change, or the smaller ship, because I’ve seen us make huge […]
News Corp. Approves Separation; Aims for June 28
The board of News Corporation formally approved the division of the company’s assets into two publicly-traded companies. They expect the spinoff to occur in a month, on June 28. As previously described, HarperCollins will join the company’s newspapers, education unit and other division in the New News Corp. which will — upon completion of the deal — be named simply News Corporation. The other assets, focused on film, television and cable/broadcasting, will name itself 21st Century Fox. The New News Corp. has already been authorized to buyback up to $500 million worth of its own shares once it starts trading, […]