Bertelsmann to sell slumping global book clubs: report

FRANKFURT (AFP) — Bertelsmann wants to sell its global book clubs because falling sales have convinced the German media group it is time to turn the page on its historic activity, a press report said on Tuesday.
A sale could be quick and complete, according to the Financial Times Deutschland, which cited unnamed sources at Bertelsmann.
In March, the company's new boss, Hartmut Ostrowski, said that the division that includes book clubs would "be restructured by mid 2009."
On Monday, Ostrowski told the news magazine Der Spiegel that selling the unit was "an option."
He added that "book clubs are losing market share, and we are concerned about how the situation will evolve."
Bertelsmann owes its expansion in the 1950s and 1960s to book clubs, which generated the money needed to develop the RTL broadcasting division.
But buyers are not looking more and more to the Internet for books, music recordings and DVDs.