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Hachette, IPG Launch Direct Sales Promos for Indies
Further to the news that Baker & Taylor is closing its retail wholesale business, both Hachette Book Group and Independent Publishers Group are offering independent booksellers special programs to transition them to direct sales.
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Unit Sales Had Small Gain in Early May, Led by Nonfiction
Unit sales of print books inched up by just under 1% in the week ended May 3, 2019, over the comparable week in 2018, at outlets that report to NPD BookScan.
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This Week's Bestsellers: May 13, 2019
Class is back in session for Stuart Gibbs’s Spy School series as the seventh installment, ‘British Invasion,’ debuts at #3 in children’s frontlist fiction. Plus the team behind ‘Dragons Love Tacos’ score with ‘High Five,’ and thriller-writing collaborators Newt Gingrich and Pete Earley put their own spin on the question of ‘Collusion.’
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PRH Offers Direct Sales to Orphaned Bookstores
In response to Baker & Taylor closing its retail wholesale business, Penguin Random House has launched the "Indies Express Program" to transition B&T indie bookstore accounts to direct sales.
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Baker & Taylor News Sparks ABA into Action
Following last week's news that Baker & Taylor is ending its retail wholesale business, the American Booksellers Association wrote to members to say it was working to limit any damage to the community and find the best solutions for moving forward.
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BISG Annual Meeting Tries to Make Sense of the Supply Chain
This year’s BISG annual meeting, held April 26 at the Harvard Club in New York City, surveyed a range of trends across the publishing supply chain.
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Soft Adult Sales Drop Units 3.6% in Late April
Weakness in the two adult categories led to a 3.6% decline in overall print unit sales in the week ended Apr. 27, 2019, compared to the same week in 2018, at outlets that report to NPD BookScan.
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This Week's Bestsellers: May 6, 2019
Scribner publishes an edition of ‘The Mueller Report’ that hits #2 in the country and sweeps the East Coast. Plus economist Emily Oster lands at #5 in hardcover nonfiction with a data-driven take on parenting, and Melinda Gates’s nonfiction debut is among the week’s notable releases.
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Industry Reacts to B&T Exiting the Retail Wholesale Business
Booksellers and former competitors alike are developing plans on how to deal with the news that Baker & Taylor will be closing down its retail wholesale business.
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Shakespeare & Co. to Open in Lower Manhattan
New York City-based bookseller Shakespeare & Co. will open a store in Brookfield Place, a retail mall in lower Manhattan, in January 2020. There, it plans to host large scale author events.
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B&T to Close Its Retail Wholesale Business
Baker & Taylor will close down its retail wholesale business in order to better align itself with the education focus of parent company Follett Corp. About 500 jobs will be lost in the process.
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White Supremacists Take Over D.C. Bookstore Reading
White supremacists briefly took over a reading by author Jonathan Metzl at the flagship location for Politics and Prose Bookstore in Washington, D.C., on Saturday, shouting “this land is our land” and marching through the store yelling the name of a group that helped to organize the 2017 Charlottesville Unite the Right rally.
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Independent Bookstore Day 2019: Photos
A total of 580 bookstores participated in the fifth annual Independent Bookstore Day, hosting special events, author readings and parties. Here are some photos from the day from our PW team and other contributors.
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NAIBA Booksellers Talk Education, Health Care, and the Bottom Line
New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association members gathered in Baltimore on April 25 for discussions about bookseller education, health care, and finances for independent bookstores across the region.
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Independent Bookstore Day 2019: Like Christmas in April
With a record number of stores participating, independent booksellers held a wide range of events to attract customers to April 27's Independent Bookstore Day.
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This Week's Bestsellers: April 29, 2019
‘The Mister,’ E.L. James’s first non–Fifty Shades romance, in #2 in the country, with her softest first week to date. Plus lauded Irish author Sally Rooney’s sophomore effort, ‘Normal People,’ lands at #6 in hardcover fiction, and Pete Buttigieg’s popularity is rising in the polls and at bookstores.
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Units Jumped 20.2% in Easter Week
The final week before Easter proved to be a boon for juvenile publishing, with sales in the nonfiction category rising 80.8% over the week ended Apr. 21, 2018, while fiction sales jumped 67.1%.
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Independent Bookstore Day Gets Even Bigger
The fifth annual Independent Bookstore Day takes place on Saturday, April 27, with 580 stores participating, up from 507 last year.
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Juvenile Titles Push Unit Sales Up 5.9% in Mid-April
Led by big gains in the juvenile categories, total print unit sales rose 5.9% in the week ended Apr. 13, 2019, over the comparable week in 2018, at outlets that report to NPD BookScan.
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This Week's Bestsellers: April 22, 2019
Chelsea Handler’s ‘Life Will Be the Death of Me,’ which PW called ‘amusingly offbeat,’ is the #2 book in the country. Plus Martha Hall Kelly is in full flower with ‘Lost Roses,’ her follow-up to ‘Lilac Girls,’ and new Macmillan imprint Celadon has its second bestseller in ‘Wolfpack.’



