Scholastic Quarter Down

With sales of the Hunger Games trilogy falling even more than expected in the quarter ended February 28 compared to a year ago, Scholastic reported that revenue for the company fell 18.5% over the same period last year, to $380.5 million, while the net loss deepened to $20.1 million from $10.3 million. As a result of the soft quarter, Scholastic lowered its forecast for the full fiscal year for the second time and is now projecting sales to be between $1.75 billion and $1.8 billion.

Hastings Cuts Back on Books

With comparable store sales of books down 1.3% in the fiscal year ended January 31—after falling 4.8% in 2011---Hastings Entertainment said it is cutting back on the space devoted to books, music, and rental as it rolls out new products in an expanded electronics department and adds to its trends section.

Reorg for SMP Marketing and Publicity

St. Martin’s Press has announced changes in its marketing and publicity departments, moving from a “format-driven orientation to an audience-and-category-focused orientation.” The reorganization will establish four core-marketing teams made up of a combination of SMP’s current marketers, publicists, and digital marketers. The teams will focus on specific categories and audiences.

Amazon’s New Literary Imprint

Amazon Publishing has begun rolling out the first titles in its newly created literary fiction imprint, Little A. A.L. Kennedy’s The Blue Book and Jake Arnott’s The House of Rumour were just released. The imprint, headed by senior editor Ed Park, will release novels, memoirs and story collections. A total of 10 titles are planned for release this year.

Random-Penguin Gets Okay In NZ

New Zealand is the third country to give its approval to the Penguin–Random House merger.

Corrections

Our review of Khaled Hosseini’s And the Mountains Echoed (March18) mistakenly listed Hosseini’s agent as Elaine Koster. He is now represented by Robert Barnett. Koster, who died in 2010, was Hosseini’s first agent, credited with discovering his bestselling The Kite Runner.

In last week’s Pomegranate Press story, we incorrectly reported that the company sold 25 million calendars since 2010. It has sold 25 million since 2000.