Interviewed by Michael Healy, Book Rights Registry Retailing scene: Borders situation.  Have to be careful talking about them because  a lot of people's jobs are on the line.  The challenge is to persuade suppliers to extend them credit.  From my point of view it is  difficult to imagine because have seen nothing in a business plan that will convince us.  Have already lost tens of millions of dollars, but will only deal with them on a cash basis.  Don't think have an enfeebled independent book-selling community.  Last year ABA grew for the first time in a decade.  More young people coming...

Tomorrow I'll be in New York City for the Publishing Point meetup.  This time they will be having a conversation with David Young, Chairman/CEO of Hachette Book Group. If you work  in New York, or who can go into New York,  you should seriously consider joining Publishing Point.  Susan Danziger has been doing a fantastic job in getting interesting speakers.  You can find them here.  Previous CEOs in The Publishing Point CEO Interview Series have included John Sargent, CEO of Macmillan, Carolyn Reidy, CEO of Simon & Schuster, and Tim O'Reilly, CEO of O'Reilly Media....

From their press release: E-book sales momentum was considerable (up 88% compared to Q1 2010), accounting for approximately 22% of revenue in the United States and 5% in the United Kingdom. This development is the result of very brisk sales of e-book readers at the end of the year. ... e-book sales will continue to grow in the United States, albeit at a less upbeat rate than in the first quarter, to reach 15% to 20% of revenues. E-books could account for 5% to 10% of revenues in the United Kingdom in 2011. ...

From the press release: Ingram Content Group Inc. today announced an agreement with Hachette UK, one of the largest and most diversified publishing groups in the United Kingdom, to archive and distribute the publisher’s e-content to partners worldwide through CoreSource®. “Our ability to reach the global market with our content in the desired formats is critical,” said Chris Emerson, Chief Operating Officer of Hachette UK. “Digital publishing is at the centre of our business and working with a publishing services leader such as Ingram Content Group helps us to deliver our content wherever and however it is wanted.” Ingram’s CoreSource is an...

From Le Figaro, via a Google translation: Opened on Thursday in Paris Book Fair, where the ebook is the star. The digital book is still non-existent in France but is already present in the United States. What is the reality of the market? "In 2010, the electronic book accounted for 8% of market value and 10% in quantity. But since the beginning of 2011, it rose to 23% of quantities sold, which is what we see on our sales. This market is growing very rapidly, "says Arnaud Noury. The downloaded books differ from those sold in bookstores? "No, it's the same...

Sigh. I suppose it was naïve of me to think that customers (little guy) could force a large company (big bully) to act fairly – in this case regarding their policy of anti-competitive ebook pricing. Yesterday I wrote that they were breaking the ACCC law that governs “Resale Price Maintenance”. I said I’d tell the ACCC and I did. To their credit, an ACCC rep got back to me today explaining the loophole (see below). Alas, large companies must have lawyers to think up ways to tiptoe around minor issues like, say, illegal pricing laws. In this...

With multinational companies chipping away at the edges of honesty, it’s easy to forget the simple things sometimes. Make no mistake – anti-competitive (aka “Agency”) pricing is illegal in Australia. Darryl Adams recently pointed this out on his blog Oz-e-Books – and it’s a timely reminder. In the face of large companies sending press releases “announcing” changes to their business practices to reinforce their “rights to set prices” across all retailers, sometimes we forget to question that. Do they have that right? Do book publishers have the right to dictate the retail price of their products, when sold...

According to an article in The Bookseller, Lagardere Publishing's sales from ebooks are: US: 8% of sales versus 3% of sales in 2009 UK: 1% of sales France: marginal...

Snow permitting, I hope to take the train into NYC to attend the Publishing Point meetup for you. David Young, the Chairman and CEO of the Hachette Book Group, will be interviewed by Michael Healy, Executive Director of the Book Rights Registry. It's at 12:30 and I have to be able to get to the train station by 9am. I'm not going to try to drive. Let's see what happens....

The Bookseller has a report of a letter sent to authors by Tim Hely Hutchinson, Hachette's ceo. Here's a snippet. A lot more at the site: In a letter to authors dominated by digital issues, Tim Hely Hutchinson said e-books were now a "significant" part of Hachette's business. He said in the United States, e-book sales had been tripling year on year, from 1% of total sales in 2008 to 9% this year. He said: "Our market in Britain and the Commonwealth is not far behind and, actually, I would not be surprised if the British and Australian markets...

Earlier this year, Guinness released a free multimedia iPad app with selected records from its latest Book of World Records (now known as simply Guinness World Records). This month, however, marks its first release of a true “e-book” edition, published by its long-time print publisher Hachette Book Group. The Guinness Book of World Records was originally developed in the 1950s by the director of Guinness Breweries, the beer company that brews the well-known stout, as an almanac for settling bar trivia disputes. It has since caught the imagination of the entire public; my librarian mother tells me that the...

From Irish Publishing News. More info in the article. Stephen Boylan, Books Purchasing Manager at Easons with responsibility for ebooks has confirmed that Easons has signed Agency contracts with Hachette and HarperCollins. Both publishers have also changed from wholesale to agency terms for ebooks in the UK, as have Canongate, Penguin and Simon & Schuster. The new agreements mean that Easons, ‘currently have a mix of agency and wholesale pricing on their ebook site,’ according to Boylan....