Finance

Sales in the children/young adult category rose 16.6% in July over July 2018, while sales of adult books increased 3.9% in the month over 2018, according to the AAP’s StatShot program.

Led by a strong performance in its trade division, revenue at Scholastic rose 7% in the first quarter ended August 31, 2019, over the comparable period in fiscal 2019. The net loss was cut to $58.5 million, from $61.3 million in last year’s first quarter.

Unit sales rose 24% in the first six months of 2019 over the comparable period in 2018, while revenue increased 26% at Sourcebooks.

Open Road said revenue in the first six months of 2019 rose 36% over the comparable period in 2018, while earnings jumped 72%.

Softness in John Wiley’s education publishing and professional learning group limited growth in the first quarter ended July 31, 2019, to 3%, and contributed to a 87% drop in operating income.

Driven by a number of acquisitions and hundreds of bestselling books, profits at Penguin Random House jumped 33.0% in the first half of 2019 over the comparable period in 2018 and revenue rose 11.3%.

In the first half of 2019 sales of adult books rose 1.4% over the comparable period in 2018, while sales of children/YA books increased 7.4%, according to the AAP. Sales of religious presses, which AAP puts in the trade segment, rose 11.4%.

The Quarto Group accomplished its three major goals during the first six months of 2019: company revenue was stabilized, operating losses were cut, and debt was reduced to $65 million, from $73.2 million in the first half of 2018.

Book sales rose by $400,000 in the second quarter of 2019 over the comparable period a year ago at Regnery Publishing, the publisher's parent company, Salem Media, reported. Sales for all of Salem's publishing division rose 3.7% in the period.

Higher sales of print books and digital audiobooks drove revenue and profit gains in the first quarter of 2019 at Simon & Schuster, and the same scenario played out for the second quarter, as sales rose to $218 million and profits reached $33 million in the period.