Gannett Sells ‘The Farmington Daily Times’ To Ballantine (mediapost.com)

Amazon now has 90 million Prime members as of Sept. 30, the end of the fiscal third quarter, which is an estimated 63% of all Amazon customers in the U.S., according to data released Wednesday by securities research firm Consumer Intelligence Research Partners (CIRP). The number of Prime customers is up 38.5% from 65 million this time last year and up 5.9% from an estimated 85 million at the end of the second quarter, June 30. Prime is Amazon’s membership program that costs shoppers $99 annually or $10.99 monthly and offers perks such as free expedited shipping and streaming video. CIRP’s estimates are based on a survey of 500 shoppers in the U.S. who made purchases from Amazon during the July-September period. Amazon does not release exact figures on the number of Prime customers. Click Read More below for additional information.

Meredith Corporation announced that it is teaming up with The Kroger Co.'s media advertising business, Kroger Precision Marketing (KPM), to offer a new integrated media service that will help CPG brands make advertising more shoppable. Meredith's offering provides brand advertisers access to Kroger's first-party purchase data and custom audience segments to power media campaigns across its portfolio of 40+ trusted, iconic food and lifestyle brands, including Allrecipes, REAL SIMPLE, EatingWell, PEOPLE, Better Homes & Gardens and Southern Living. The new integration marks the first time that brand advertisers on Meredith properties will be able to apply closed-loop sales data from Kroger to their campaigns. The service launches at a time when brands need to re-engage consumers whose shopping patterns have been disrupted. Meredith and Kroger Precision Marketing, by matching premium content with sales data, are positioned to influence product discovery, meal planning, product trial, and shopping routines.

Amazon Publishing has launched Amazon Original Stories, a new imprint that will release short fiction and nonfiction works that can be read in a single sitting. The essays and reported pieces, available in the Kindle Singles store, will be free to Prime and Kindle Unlimited members. The pieces will be $1.99 for all other customers. The imprint's first titles are The Sign of the Beast by Joyce Carol Oates and Crown Heights by Colin Warner and Carl King. Forthcoming 2018 titles from the imprint include works by W. Kamau Bell, Jade Chang, Eddie Huang, Janice Y.K. Lee, Walter Kirn, Dean Koontz, Wednesday Martin, Nick McDonell, Harold Schechter, Dan Slater, Dodai Stewart, and Susan Straight. Click Read More below for additional information.