Waterstone’s parent company HMV issued a brief trading update, reporting that in the ten-week holiday sales period ending January 2, same-store sales at the bookstore chain declined 8.9 percent. Managing director Gerry Johnson has been dismissed, and HMV group development director Dominic Myers has taken over management of Waterstone’s “with immediate effect.” (BTW, total e-book downloads for the period were 80,000 units.) HMV head Simon Fox says, “Whilst the recent performance of Waterstone’s has been unsatisfactory, it remains an excellent business and brand, with a great opportunity as the only remaining specialist bookseller on the High Street.” Fox indicates to […]
EMPG Confirms Negotiations, Says Lender/Owners to Provide New Working Capital
Further to this morning’s story on a restructuring of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt parent company EMPG which is considered likely to wipe out existing equity holders, the company issued this statement: “We are in advanced discussions regarding a comprehensive, consensual balance sheet restructuring. A substantial majority of the company’s most significant lenders have already agreed to the framework for this restructuring plan, which will put the company on a stronger financial footing for the future. “Moreover, certain of our lenders have committed to make substantial new investments in the company in connection with this restructuring. Significantly, the plan will enhance liquidity […]
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Financial House of Cards Reported Ready to Fall
Two debt restructurings last year still left Houghton Mifflin Harcourt parent company Education and Media Publishing Group (EMPG) straining to sustain their debt obligations and covenants, and reports from Ireland indicate yet another restructuring is in the works that would wipe out equity-holders entirely and turn the company over to its secured lenders. Investors losing out would include the financial genius behind the $9 billion worth of acquisitions, Barry O’Callaghan, whose interest was reduced to about 20 percent of the company last August. (He also made himself ceo of HMH last year when Tony Lucki wisely retired.) But it also […]
Bookselling: Bodhi Tree to Close
Owners of Los Angeles-based Bodhi Tree Bookstore Phil Thompson and Stan Madson reportedly told their staff last week that the store will be shutting its doors in a year’s time” after almost 40 years in business, LA Weekly reports. With both owners in their 70s, they decided to sell the building on Melrose Avenue to a real estate developer.LAW
People
Direct Brands has hired David Gitow as chief marketing officer and Alan Katz as evp, business development, the first major appointments under new ceo Deborah Fine. Gitow was cmo at both BN.com and Barnes & Noble, and in a long time stretch at Time, Inc. founded and ran Time, Inc. Home Entertainment. Katz has had a long career in magazine publishing, including executive positions at Vanity Fair and New York. BookEnds Literary Agency co-founder Jacky Sach will retire from publishing after 10 years as an agent for “new opportunities.” Sach began her publishing career in 1985 at Berkley. BookEnds will […]
Founder Buys Back Stone Bridge; Quirk Announces 'Android Karenina'; Jacky Sach to Retire, and More
Founder of Stone Bridge Press Peter Goodman has reacquired 100 percent of the company’s shares from its Japanese owner, IBC Publishing of Tokyo. Goodman sold Stone Bridge to Japanese book distributor Yohan in 2005 and passed to its one-time subsidiary IBC in 2007 right before Yohan declared bankruptcy. Goodman, who has been an executive at Stone Bridge since its founding in 1989, will continue to lead the company as publisher and editor-in-chief from their current offices near North Berkeley, CA. He notes, “The Japanese owners at IBC have always been generous in spirit, and they did the best they could […]