S&S Stays Hot  

by Jim Milliot -- Publishers Weekly, 11/1/2007 1:14:00 PM

A strong fourth quarter line-up helped lift results in the third quarter at Simon & Schuster. Joel Osteen’s Become a Better You, which didn’t go on sale until October 15 but which shipped before the end of the quarter, was a key title for the company as was the year-long blockbuster The Secret, which “roared back to life” in the just completed period, said CEO Jack Romanos, speculating that many accounts were stocking up for the fall and holiday season on the title. In December, a follow-up, The Secret Gratitude Book, will hit stores.

 Romanos said that sales were up across all divisions in the quarter, resulting in a 9% increase in total revenue, to $214.2 million, and a 6% gain in operating profit, to $21.6 million. Growth in profits was limited by higher expenses, including costs associated with S&S’s digital archive project. Romanos said the majority of the expenses of converting all its titles to digital formats will be borne in the third and fourth quarter, adding that S&S is on track to convert 13,000 titles by the end of 2007.

Romanos was confident that sales in the fourth quarter, his final as CEO, will be solid. In addition to Secret Gratitude and Become, other potential big books include Fair Game, Christmas with Paula Deen, You: Staying Young and Angela and the Baby Jesus.

For the first nine months of the year, S&S sales rose 16%, to $643.8 million, and operating profit soared 90%, to $61.1 million.