Pearson released results for the six-months ending June 30 on Friday morning, with COVID-related impact weighing heavily on their sales. The company reported sales of £1.49 billion, down from £1.83 billion last year, a decline of 19 percent largely due to test center and school closures affecting its global assessment and international segments. North American…
Scholastic’s Sales Fell 40% in Q4, Even as Trade Books Surged
Scholastic reported fourth quarter and full-year results for the period ending May 31 on Thursday afternoon. As expected, school closures due to coronavirus weighed heavily on their performance for the quarter, with overall sales of $284 million, down 40 percent compared to $471 million last year. Trade sales, however, surged to $80.4 million from $55.4…
Briefs: Mary Trump’s Continuing Sales, and More
Mary Trump’s TOO MUCH AND NEVER ENOUGH sold over 1.35 million units across all formats during its first week on sale in the US, Simon & Schuster reported. Another hardcover reprint will give them 1.35 million copies in print when it delivers. That suggests continuing sales of about 400,000 units after pre-orders and the first…
Briefs
Controversies After UK thriller writer Mark Dawson admitted — or boasted? — about buying his way onto the Sunday Times bestseller list with a modest purchase of 400 hardcovers, Nielsen Bookscan has recalculated that Top 10 chart to remove Dawson’s book and the paper will issue a correction. Nielsen says they initially believed the purchase…
WME Joins In Raising Assistants’ Compensation
William Morris Endeavor has responded to the #PayUpHollywood initiative by joining other large talent agencies in raising compensation for their assistants. The starting salary for assistants will go from $15 an hour — the legal minimum wage in New York City — to $18 an hour (or $37,440 annually). More importantly, given that almost no…
Publishers May Have to Scramble If Buyers of LSC’s Assets “Wind-Down” Contracts
The auction for the assets of bankrupt LSC Communications has been postponed to August 25, from August 5, as book publishers recently lost a court battle to give them more time if the buyers elect not to assume their existing contracts. Because bankruptcy abrogates many existing obligations, the ultimate buyers of LSC’s assets would have…