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Booksellers Urged to Participate in Banned Books Week
There were 460 incidents of people attempting to ban books from libraries last year, according to the American Library Association, including a recent one where a group of parents succeeded in banning an anthology of writings by gay youth from the library of a New Jersey high school and from the local public library. With the 28th annual Banned Book Weeks coming up September 25 to October 2, the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression is asking booksellers to join the hundreds of bookstores and libraries that already have publicized such incidents.
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Davis-Kidd to Feature Marty Stuart Display
Baker & Taylor has partnered with Nashville's Davis-Kidd Booksellers, Sugar Hill Records, and country music star Marty Stuart on a merchandise display dubbed Marty Stuart's The Art of Country Music. The display, which B&T is calling "a store within Davis-Kidd’s Nashville outlet," will feature a section called Marty Selects, which will highlight CDs, DVDs, and books selected by Stuart.
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More Borders Layoffs and More Rumors
Borders is laying off 100 workers at its Tennessee distribution center following an earlier cut of 120 jobs.
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B&N Considering Sale; Riggio May Make Bid
The Barnes & Noble board announced Tuesday afternoon following the close of the stock market that it will consider all alternatives for the bookstore chain, including the sale of the company. The board said it considers B&N's stock price to be significantly undervalued. B&N chairman Len Riggio said he is considering taking part in an investor group to buy the company.
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Ill-Conceived Odyssey
Just about everyone in publishing has weighed in on the Wylie Agency's decision to seize backlist e-book rights, jump into the publishing game, and sign an exclusive deal to sell e-titles only through Amazon. In the retail space, neither Barnes & Noble nor Borders would comment on the sales policy of Odyssey Editions, but independent booksellers are unhappy about the development and angered at Andrew Wylie.
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Teicher: Wylie's Exclusive Amazon Deal 'Bad for the Industry'
American Bookseller Association CEO Oren Teicher released an official statement on Odyssey Editions late yesterday afternoon, and, unsurprisingly, it isn't supportive of the Wylie Agency's endeavor. Teicher called Wylie's exclusive deal with Amazon "bad for the book industry and bad for consumers."
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ABFFE Elects Two New Board Members
The American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression has two new board members. Roberta Rubin, owner of The Book Stall at Chestnut Court in Winnetka, Ill., and Patricia Johnson, executive v-p and editorial director of Knopf, Pantheon and Schocken Books, have just been elected to three-year terms.
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Borders Signs Deal with Wi Fi Advertising Company
Borders has reached an agreement with JiWire, a location-based mobile media company with an advertising platform, to enable companies to run ads across Borders' Wi Fi network. According to JiWire, any time a user connects to Wi Fi in any Border' locations "they will see location-targeted messages and offers from leading national brands." Under terms of the agreement,Borders will receive a piece of the advertising revenue.
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Indies Respond to RH/Wylie Showdown, Chains Stay Mum
The Authors Guild, John Sargent, and a number of independent booksellers, have all expressed their dismay over the Wylie Agency's decision to sell its forthcoming ebooks from Odyssey Editions exclusively through Amazon. But what do the two biggest bricks and mortar retailers think? No comment.
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Borders Enters Online Textbook Market; Completes Paperchase Deal
Borders has teamed with Alibris to sell new and used textbooks online through Borders Textbook Marketplace. The retailer has also completed its deal to sell Paperchase.
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Why? Publishers Answer Booksellers' Questions
Booksellers and publishers may be in the same business, but they don't always understand life on the other side of the fence. Here publishers address frequent bookseller queries about everything from book club paperbacks to a perceived dearth of middle-grade fare and age-appropriateness.
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Event Network Links Gift Shops, Customers
The concept of creating marketing "stories" for gift shops has been successful for Event Network, in San Diego, the company that has managed and supplied books and gift items to more than 60 cultural institutions and attractions in North America since 1998.
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Coalition Challenges New Massachusetts Internet Law
A coalition of organizations, including publishers and booksellers, filed suit on Tuesday to block a Massachusetts law that would ban certain works from the Internet deemed to be "harmful to minors." Signed into law this past April, and in effect as of yesterday, Chapter 74 of the Acts of 2010 makes anyone who operates a Web site or communicates through an electronic listserv criminally liable for nudity or sexually related material, if the material is found to be "harmful to minors."
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Walker to Leave MBA in January
Susan Walker, executive director of the Midwest Booksellers Association for the past 23 years, the longest-serving director of any of the regional bookseller associations, announced in a letter sent to MBA members Sunday that she is resigning her position, as of January 2011. Walker is moving to her native North Carolina by the end of January to care for her elderly parents in the Charlotte area.
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New England Reader Project Due Next Summer
Delphinium/HarperCollins is continuing its ambitious project to do a bookseller/librarian version of State by State: A Panoramic Portrait of America (Ecco), edited by Matt Weiland and Sean Wilsey, itself inspired by the WPA Guides of the 1930s, with a call for submissions for The New England Reader, due out in summer 2011. It will include essays on New York, as well as Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Massachusetts.
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Riggio Testifies at Trial
Barnes & Noble chairman Len Riggio took the stand Friday in the lawsuit brought against the retailer by investor Ron Burkle and defended the poison pill adopted by the company aimed at limiting Burkle, or any outside investor's, stake in the company. During his testimony, Riggio said one of his concerns about Burkle was that he would push for a takeover of Borders.
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Summer Lovers
Running an independent bookstore is a difficult business, and those booksellers who rely heavily on tourists to stay profitable face even more challenges, like weather and being a bit out of the typical publishing cycle. Still, there remains a group of store owners who have found a way to make a living selling books in tourist destinations, and the 2010 vacation season appears to be starting off fairly well
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Barnes & Noble Trial Begins
Ron Burkle's lawsuit looking to strike down Barnes & Noble's poison pill provision began in Delaware yesterday with Burkle one of the first witnesses. He testified that the provision made it impossible to talk to other shareholders and reiterated his belief that the measure was aimed at keeping the Riggio family in control of the retailer. The trial is expected to last four days. For more click here.
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Borders Meeting Set to Enhance LeBow's Power
A special shareholders meeting has been called for September 29 that will further cement Bennett LeBow's leadership of Borders. At that meeting, shareholders will be asked to approve a proposal to give LeBow's company, LeBow Gamma Limited, the right to acquire 35.1 million shares of the retailer for $2.25 per share. A second proposal will require LeBow Gamma's approval before any executive officers can be changed.
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New Children's Bookstore in Maine
Michael Curtis, owner of Union River Book and Toy Co. in Ellsworth, Maine, is the latest property owner to turn to bookselling to fill an empty storefront. However, unlike others in real estate, Curtis already had years of experience selling books: his parents owned Sherman’s Books in Bar Harbor, which turns 125 next summer.
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