In the second quarter ended August 1, revenue at Books-A-Million fell 0.4%, to $107.9 million, and the net loss was $5.8 million, nearly double the net loss of $3 million in the same period a year ago. Sales at stores open at least a year fell 0.3%.
BAM CEO and president Terrance G. Finley commented: "While we benefitted late in the quarter from the phenomenal success of Harper Lee's Go Set a Watchman and E.L. James' Grey, we were not able to fully offset the significant prior year media driven sales of John Green's Fault in Our Stars, Veronica Roth's Divergent series and Todd Burpo's Heaven Is for Real. Again, this quarter we saw strong performances in our cafés and in our general merchandise departments."
In a conference call (via SeekingAlpha.com) with analysts yesterday, Finley added that other strong adult fiction titles included The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins and The Martian by Andy Weir.
He said, too, that adult coloring books "drove large increases in the art and new age categories," and in biography, strong titles included The Wright Brothers by David McCullough and "multiple titles from YouTube personalities like Joey Graceffa, Shane Dawson and Connor Franta." Manga contributed to "significant growth" in sales of graphic novels.
All areas of children's books did well, and "the release of the never before published Dr. Seuss' title, What Pet Should I Get, bought an additional excitement to the beginning readers section."
Finley called the fall lineup "solid, with an abundance of great new commercial fiction from the likes of John Grisham, Sue Grafton, Lee Child and many more and I am sure Bill O'Reilly's September non-fiction release Killing Reagan will have a long run at the top of our bestseller list."