Scholastic Corporation reported year-over-year quarterly sales declines in both trade and book fairs in its most recent quarterly report, despite growth in the number of fairs. “[S]chools booked the largest number of fall fairs since the pandemic,” Scholastic CEO Peter Warwick told analysts in the conference call last week, but Book Fairs revenues were down 5% from the year ago quarter.  The company said that a larger proportion of fall season fairs were ending up in December, after the period ended, but acknowledged lower revenue per fair, which it attributed to the addition of new, smaller fairs into the mix.  Expectations remain for at least 90,000 fairs in fiscal 2025. 

Overall publishing results for Scholastic’s fiscal Q2 ended November 30 were also down, with trade sales down 13%, more than the book fairs decline.  Warwick said that the sales declines were due to release timing, and the company reaffirmed positive guidance for the full fiscal year. 

Both Scholastic revenues and earnings were misses for the quarter, according to SeekingAlpha: non-GAAP EPS of $1.82 was a $0.48 miss, and revenue of $544.6 million was a $9.4 million miss. The stock is trading at around 20% below where it was prior to the earnings release.

In Scholastic’s Graphix imprint, flagship property Dog Man has been losing some steam, with volume-over-volume sales declines (see “May 2024 Circana BookScan”).