Varsity Is King? Not Quite, But They're Not Worst-of-Breed Either
By Jim Milliot and Steven Zeitchik, PW Newsline -- Publishers Weekly, 4/2/2002
Most book publishing people stopped paying attention to Varsity at about the same time it stopped being fun to poke fun at people who used words like turnkey, but the former college bookseller is happy about its new plans regardless.In case you've forgotten, the company's idea is to serve as a kind of bookselling wholesaler for high school and private colleges. While it hasn't been a magic pill, the plan has improved some of its numbers.
Revenues at the D.C. firm declined this year from $28.5 million to $12.5, but the company only lost $2.2 million and even posted marginally positive cash flow. The company lost $28.5 million in '00. After drastic layoffs, in the last few months it has also added some employees; total staffers now number about twenty.
Its modest successes are driven largely by the new program, known as eduPartners. Next year the company expects nearly all of its revenues to come from it.
The targeting of Varsity's business has meant it now only spends a fraction on sales and marketing as it once did - $1.7 million compared to more than $20 million. It has about $16.8 million in cash, which may not be scaleable but just might be a solution.
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