Borders sells off Day by Day Calendar business in bid to raise cash
Ann Arbor-based Borders Group Inc. said today that it is selling its Day by Day Calendar Co. unit.
The sale of the division comes as Borders is conserving cash in a bid to avoid bankruptcy. Borders executives had said they would seek to sell assets to boost its financial position.
"With the sale of this business, we can continue to place a focus on the areas of our business that we feel will improve profitability and cash flow," Borders spokeswoman Mary Davis said in a statement.
Day by Day, sold to Austin, Texas-based Calendar Holdings LLC, is a collection of 420 kiosks and stores.
Davis declined to reveal the sale price but said the company would "share key details about the sale" in its next earnings report and regulatory filings.
The sale comes six months after Borders sold its its Paperchase Products Ltd. stationery unit to British private investment firm Primary Capital Ltd. for $31 million.
Borders, which lost $74.4 million in its most recent fiscal quarter, has said it could face a cash crunch in early 2011 if it can't find a new source of lending and restructure vendor financing agreements. The book store chain is currently trying to convince publishers to accept short-term debt in exchange for missed payments.
Borders stock (NYSE: BGP) closed at $0.85 a share, up $0.01 for the day.
Borders employs about 550 workers at its corporate headquarters in Ann Arbor. The company last week laid off 40 workers at the headquarters.
Contact AnnArbor.com's Nathan Bomey at (734) 623-2587 or nathanbomey@annarbor.com. You can also follow him on Twitter or subscribe to AnnArbor.com's newsletters.
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