Notes: Mayor Bookseller?; Oprah Effect; B&N Stores
Craig Maxwell, owner of Maxwell's House of Books in La Mesa, Calif., is a candidate for mayor of La Mesa, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune. Maxwell, who founded the store three years ago, is grandson of Vernon Wahrenbrock, who was the longtime owner of Wahrenbrock's Books in San Diego.
If elected, Maxwell would join such illustrious company as Neal Coonerty of Bookshop Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, Calif., Richard Howorth of Square Books, Oxford, Miss., and Tom Lowry of Lowry's Books in Three Rivers and Sturgis, Mich. (and mayor of Three Rivers).
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Starbucks, which has chosen Mitch Albom's forthcoming For One More Day to be the first major book title it sells under the new program it announced earlier this year, will sell the book at its full retail price of $21.95. When we wrote yesterday's issue, we had thought the company would discount the title--but we were misinformed.
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The Chicago Sun-Times delves into what it takes for an author to get on Oprah. The main example is Michele Weldon, a Chicago native and journalism professor who thought her 1999 memoir, I Closed My Eyes: Revelations of a Battered Woman, was ideal for Oprah. Weldon called 12 times over the years and eventually was granted an appearance--although no book club selection. Weldon estimated that she sold 35,000 copies of the book because of her appearance. Not surprisingly, she commented: "So I forever respect her impact on the marketplace."
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Barnes & Noble has signed leases for two more stores, one of which will replace an existing store. Both outlets will stock the usual nearly 200,000 book, music, movie and magazine titles.
In Huntsville, Ala., a new store that will open in May 2007 in the Bridge Street Town Centre at I-565 and Highway 72/Highway 255 will replace the current B&N at University Village.
Also next May, B&N will open a store in Cherry Hill, N.J., in Town Place at Garden State Park at 911 Haddonfield Road.
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The Houstonist speculates that the former Alabama Theater in Houston, Tex., home of one of the first Bookstops and one of the first bookstores in a onetime theater, may be redeveloped and that Bookstop, owned by Barnes & Noble since 1989, may either be forced out or be replaced by "the possibility" of a new Barnes & Noble at the River Oaks shopping center.
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Strictly by the Book, the bargain and remainder company, has bought a 255,000-sq.-ft. warehouse in Bridgewater, Mass., near its Fall River, Mass., headquarters, and will use it for book sorting, according to Bargain Book News. CEO Erez Bredmehl said that the company will expand its "sorting units up to a half million a week."
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Bargain Book News also reported that West Coast Bargain Books is closing. Owner Mitch Press will stay in the business and work for his brother, Jeff Press, owner of World Publications, North Dighton, Mass.
