According to the Wall Street Journal, HarperCollins Publishers will close two warehouses in the U.S., a sign of how the growth of digital books is prompting book publishers to rethink how they distribute print books. Harper will hand off warehousing and distribution services for all its titles in the U.S. to R.R. Donnelley & Sons which already prints most of HarperCollins's books in the U.S. The switch is likely effective summer 2013.
At that point, all HarperCollins books, including those from its religious imprints, will be warehoused and shipped from a Donnelley facility in the Midwest. The pact expands on an earlier agreement in 2011 between HarperCollins and Donnelley that called for Donnelley to provide some warehousing and distribution services in the U.S. That deal allowed HarperCollins to close two of four warehouses."We want our investments to be in marketing and editorial," said Brian Murray, chief executive of HarperCollins. "Streamlining our physical distribution chain with Donnelley will create a simpler, faster supply chain, and virtually one-stop shopping for retailers."
Publishers are reassessing their printing and distribution infrastructure as e-books takes a greater portion of overall book sales. E-books don't require paper, printing, binding, or warehousing. When Bertelsmann SE & Co.'s Random House and Pearson PLC's Penguin Group announced plans to merge last week, they cited the ability of the combined company to "generate synergies from shared resources such as warehousing, distribution, printing and central functions."
HarperCollins will close warehouses in Scranton, Pa., and Nashville, leaving only a book returns center in La Porte, Ind. The company declined to say how many employees would be laid off.
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