Follett to Close Canadian Office

By Daniel Draper, UWFA Administrative Assistant

Early this month, Follett – the company that now controls the UW Bookstore – announced that it would be closing its Ottawa offices and centralizing its operations in Oak Brook, Illinois. According to reports, Follett will be moving its trade book purchasing and sourcing to Illinois, while moving some of the other responsibilities to its bookstores in Canada.

The move to close the Canadian offices has caused serious concern for local publishers, including Wayne Antony of Fernwood Publishing. In a letter to Dr. Axworthy, he expressed concern that “only the largest national and international publishers will be able to effectively present their titles to the Follett buyer in Illinois. Local and Canadian publishers and authors have been, for the most part, shut out of the new U of W bookstore.”

Click to read more ...

Community May Not Extend Past Words

By Mark Golden, UWFA Member-at-Large

The University of Winnipeg’s commitment to the local community does not always extend beyond words.

A local academic publisher (and sometime U of W instructor in Sociology) has questioned the recent decision to contract out the management of the new campus bookstore to a mammoth multinational. Follett Higher Education runs over 800 college bookstores in the US and thirty-something in Canada.

Click to read more ...