MAIN NEWS HEADLINES
January 04 – January 11 , 2007 Edition

Half Price Books Opens
Internet Remainder
Site for Resellers

DALLAS, TX 1/2/2007—Wholesalers, booksellers and retailers worldwide will now be able to order remaindered books from a new online source. Half Price Books has recently launched TexasBookman.com, a wholly owned subsidiary, to sell remaindered titles at bargain prices. Remainders are new titles that haven’t sold in the traditional marketplace and are now being deeply discounted by publishers.

Resellers can now quickly order for resale about 1500 titles online for 50% of the already discounted price. The books are wholesaled at deep discounts on a non-returnable basis.

“We are excited about giving our wholesale customers up-to-the-minute inventory numbers and faster, more accurate order fulfillment,” said James Crates, sales manager for TexasBookman.com.

The Internet ordering system augments the 35-year-old company’s quarterly print catalogs that will still be available for customers who request them. Half Price Books continues to have a substantial presence at trade shows and maintain a strong field sales force.

Half Price Books buys and sells anything printed or recorded (except yesterday’s newspaper). The company has 87 retail stores in 14 states, with each store carrying a unique variety of new and used books, music, movies and games. The company continues to grow, having opened new stores in Missouri, Ohio, Kentucky and Texas within the past year. In 2005, Half Price Books expanded its stores to the Chicago area, opening in the Village of Niles. HPB also opened two new Chicagoland stores November 2006 and an 88th store will opening February 2007 in Westerville, Ohio. Eight more new outlets are planned this year.

According to the Book Industry Study Group (BISG) statistics (a new report is due out in February or March 2007) used book sales are “exploding.” For the calendar year 2004 (latest available figures), total used-book revenue exceeded $2.2 billion, with 111 million used-book units sold, up 11 percent over 2003. Overall, used book sales are estimated to comprise 8.4% of total consumer spending on books. The explosion in used book sales is a direct result of e-commerce which makes used books easier to find and to buy. Jeff Hayes, group director for InfoTrends, and principal analyst for the BISG study, has been quoted in the media as saying: “Used books are now a factor in the business equation for publishers and booksellers.” (Bookselling This Week, March 2006).