U.S. Postal Service targets small businesses with same-day delivery (chainstoreage.com)

Coldwater Creek will be revived – online and in print. CWC Companies, parent company of the women’s apparel retailer, which shut down operations at the end of July, has been acquired by Newtimes Group, one of world’s largest supply providers to the apparel industry. The Hong Kong-based Newtimes said it purchased CWC’s inventory and intellectual property assets from Sycamore Partners for $12.2 million. Newtimes plans to operate the acquired assets as an independent entity under the newly formed Coldwater International and will provide sourcing and back-office support. The company plans to relaunch the Coldwater Creek website in a few weeks and issue a new Coldwater Creek catalogue before the end of the year.

It’s been a rather tumultuous year for magazine media, to say the least. With so many consumers reading content on digital platforms, it appears that many publishers are reducing print frequencies or altogether shuttering print editions of magazines to focus on digital initiatives and cut costs. While most publishers seem to be drifting away from print, Bauer Media Group is doing just the opposite. In 2018, the media giant is not only continuing its print editions, but also increasing frequencies for four of its titles, with Life & Style slated to rise from 51 to 53 issues, and Closer, In Touch and Woman’s World from 52 to 53 issues. “Bauer earns a positive margin on every issue from single copy sales,” Bauer CEO Steven Kotok (pictured) tells Folio:. “So the more issues we publish, the more money we earn, unlike an ad-dependent model in which fewer ads each year are spread over the same number of issues.” Click Read More below for additional information.

The Association of American Publishers (AAP) today released its StatShot report for December 2020 reflecting reported revenue for all tracked categories, including Trade (Consumer Books), K-12 Instructional Materials, Higher Education Course Materials, Professional Publishing, and University Presses. Total revenues across all categories for December 2020 were down 8.5% as compared to December 2019, coming in at $1.1 billion. Year-to-date sales were flat, with an increase of 0.1% as compared to calendar 2019, with a total of $14.8 billion. Trade (Consumer Books) sales were up 9.5% in December, coming in at $796.1 million. For January-December 2020 Trade sales were up 9.7% as compared to the same period last year, coming in at $8.6 billion. In terms of physical paper format revenues during the month of December, in the Trade (Consumer Books) category, Hardback revenues were up 14.2%, coming in at $312.5 million; Paperbacks were up 2.4%, with $248.1 million in revenue; Mass Market was down 1.6% to $25.9 million; and Board Books were up 6.2%, with $16.7 million in revenue.