College stores to reward loyalty

OBERLIN, Ohio, May 15, 2004 -- The National Association of College Stores is testing a loyalty program that rewards customers at member stores with points based on how much they spend, according to the latest monthly report from the Association of Ameican Publishers. The points are redeemable online for clothing and food coupons. Ten stores are part of the test. Marianne Wascak, marketing vice president at NACS, said many students already know about loyalty programs with their credit cards. Points may be available for selling used texts in bookstore buy-back periods. Participants can check constantly updated account information online from each store's site. It will be NACS, however -- not the stores -- that operate the program, Wascak said, noting that loyalty programs are too expensive for stores to do on their own.

NASCORP

March gloomy in book trade

NEW YORK, May 14, 2004 -- Publishing sales overall lagged slightly in March in the United States, especially in genres in which academic authors mostly write. Textbook returns, created a deficit of $40.2 million for higher-ed sales. March is always a seasonally bad year in college publishing because of returns, but the loss was more than nine multiples of the $4.9 million March 2003 deficit. El-hi basal and supplemental sales were up a narrow 2.4 percent in March, Sales of university hardbound books posted a slight gain of 2.1 percent in a turnaround from early-year losses. University press paperbacks lost 39.8 percent. Here is the year-to-date data as extrapolated from 92 reporting publishers: El-hi Univ press (hard) Prof'l, scholarly Univ press (soft) College March 2.4% 2.1% -3.6% -35.6% -820.0% Year- to-date 4.2% -9.0% -8.7% -39.8% N/R * * N/R = Not reported

EARLIER DATA

Rowman buys Government Institutes

LANHAM, Maryland, May 12, 2004 -- Reference and textbook publisher Government Institutes, which specializes in regulatory information, has been acquired by Rowman Littlefield. Rowman said the imprint name will be retained to capitalize on the GI reputation among librarians, academics and corporate subscribers. The GI unit, however, will be integrated in Rowman's Scarecrow Press division. Financial terms of the deal were not announced, but GI will relocate from Rockville, Maryland, to Lanham, Maryland, and Blue Ridge Summit, Pennsylvania. GI publisher Edward Kurdyla remains in charge. Among GI's publications aree the Environmental Law Handbook, in its 17th edition. GI has online monitoring services of federal shipping, health, pharmaceutical and other regulatory news.

ROWMAN LITTLEFIELD

Copperhouse crim-justice list to Thomson

NEW YORK, May 11, 2004 -- The 44-title Copperhouse Publishing Company criminal justice list has been bought by Thomson Higher Education. Susan Badger, Thomson Higher Ed chief executive, said the acquisition gives adopters more choices: "Our full portfolio of options for the criminal justice curriculum now include hardcover, full-color titles with extensive multimedia teaching and learning solutions, as well as black and white budget alternatives." The Copperhouse titles, which include 44 paperbacks, will become part of the Thomson Wadsworth imprint. Terms were not announced.

WADS- WORTH

Robert W. Ingram (accounting), University of Alabama, Thomas L. Albright (accounting), University of Alabama, Bruce A. Baldwin (accounting), Arizona State University West, and John Hill (accounting), Indiana University, wrote the third edition of Accounting: Information for Decisions (South-West). Richard Jusko, vice president and business manager at Harris Publishing, was named vice president of sales at Chelsea House. Frederic H. Martini (anatomy and physiology), University of Hawaii, wrote Anatomy and Physiology, a slimmed-down version, (Benjamin Cummings). Don O'Hagen, senior vice president of technology investment at Pearson Technology, was named editor-in-chief at Pearson Education's Addison-Wesley / Prentice Hall in both Boston and Upper Saddle River, New Jersey. John Vivian (mass communication), Winona State University, wrote the seventh edition of The Media of Mass Communication (Allyn & Bacon).

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Journals in joint Google project

IBM preloading texts on school computers

McGraw-Hill: Sales at McGraw-Hill Education grew 6.4 percent to $278.2 million in the company's first quarter, compared to a year earlier. El-hi sales grew 8.6 percent to $125.1 million. Sales in the college/international grouo grew 4.7 percent to $153.1 million.

Thomson: Sales grew 9 percent to $1.7 billion in the company's first period, compared to a year earlier.

Thomson offers physician courses free

NEW YORK, May 8, 2004 -- Media giant Thomson launched a medical education web site called www.freeCME.com for physicians to earn continuing education credits at no cost. Programs include independent online study, live symposia and case-based interactive courses.

THOMSON LEARNING

McGraw tests cell-phone studyware

NEW YORK, May 6, 2004 -- Business and economic education publisher McGraw-Hill/Irwin introduced a pilot educational program, called Study to Go, for cell phones with Internet access. With Study to Go, students can tap into textbook-correlated quizzes, key terms and flashcards on their Palm and Pocket PC devices with their cell phone Internet browser. Beta versions correlate with Nickels, McHugh and McHugh's Understanding Business and Larson, Wild and Chiapett's Fundamentals of Accounting Principles. Additional titles are planned by September. McGraw says the Study To Go product complements the PowerWeb To Go program now available for 26 titles.

TEXT- BOOKS TECH- NOLOGY

Haights Cross buys test firm

WHITE PLAINS, New York, May 5, 2004 -- Publisher Haights Cross Communications, which is shifting its focus to the el-hi and library markets, has bought the test prep publisher Buckle Down Publishing.

HAIGHTS CROSS

Textbook cost bills pass burdle

Wiley publishing Mergent handbooks

NEW YORK, May 4, 2004 -- Three Mergent Inc. investment handbooks will be published by John Wiley & Sons. Mergent said the deal will expand customer access to the handbooks in retail outlets. Included are the spring 2004 edition of Mergent's Dividend Achievers Handbook, Mergent's Handbook of Common Stocks and Mergent's Handbook of NASDAQ Stocks.

JOHN WILEY & SONS

Pearson offers half-price online texts

UPPER SADDLE RIVER, New Jersey, May 3, 2004 -- The largest U.S. textbook publisher, Pearson Education, will sell college textbooks at half price to students who download them. The digital textbook program involves 300 books that Pearson said cover most subjects. Not available will be books with complex permissions and with quantitative notations. Sections of the book can be printed but not entire books, the company said. In the complete download versions, students can make annotations, take notes, search the full text and add bookmarks. Students use their Explorer, Netscape or other browser to access the materials. An e-reader device is not needed. The project, a joint effort of Pearson and O'Reilly Media, is called SafariX Textbooks Online. Students will log on to www.Safari.com and subsribe to books they need. Pearson Education president Will Ethridge said SafariX is a response to recent concern about the rising cost of higher education. Ethridge said a recent Pearson found that half of the student questioned said they were likely to buy a low cost online text if they could save $25. Of the students surveyed, 31 do not buy all of their required texts.

PEARSON EDUCATION SAFARI

Michael Gavelek, formerly at Budget Group and Coca Cola, was named vice president of marketing at Sunburst Technology, a division of Thayer Capital Partners that acquired the company from Houghton Mifflin in 2002. Oakley S. Ray (health), Vanderbilt School of Medicine, and Charles J. Ksir, (health) University of Wyoming-Laramie, wrote the 10th edition of Drugs, Society and Human Behavior (McGraw-Hill). Iris Stuart (business), California State University, Fullerton, and Bruce (business), California State University, Fullerton, wrote Ethics in the Post-Enron Age (South-West).

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McGraw helped by No Child law

NEW YORK, May 2, 2004 -- The chair of McGraw-Hill, Terry McGraw, said recent growth in sales of the company's education unit is attributable in part to federal incentives in the No Child Left Behind law. McGraw's education sales increased 6.4 percent in the first thee months of 2004. McGraw said that funds from the No Child act are finding its way into the market. There will be further impact in the second and third quarters, he said.

Texas district opts for e-books