You could call them secret shoppers. Like the plainclothes informants who check out department stores for a lapse in customer service, publishers who slip on authors’ shoes return from their writing experience armed with anecdotes and tips that market research can’t devine. What many intelligencers see shocks them. Even thirty-year publishing veterans see their industry…Continue Reading
PEOPLE Betsy Groban has been named VP Publisher of Children’s Books at Houghton Mifflin. She had previously been at WGBH and prior to that, at Little, Brown. Earlier this month Linda Magram was promoted to the new position of Director of Marketing for the entire children’s book group, adding responsibilities for such imprints as Kingfisher…Continue Reading
Rarely a week goes by without a PW or Publishers Lunch announcement of a newly formed, merged or expanded literary agency. Larry Kirshbaum‘s well-publicized move from TWBG to form LJK Literary Management last fall drew attention to publishers-turned-agents, and both Gawker and MediaBistro consistently blog about who’s merging with whom to spawn the newest so-called…Continue Reading
PEOPLE As we move into summer, some job changes include geographic movement, along with the usual hopping across town: Close to home Laurie Rippon, Publisher of CollinsDesign, is leaving HarperCollins effective July 31. She may be contacted through the company until then. Meanwhile, Steve Wasserman, fresh from his LA Times gig, is once again a…Continue Reading
PEOPLE April began with the front page NYT story about Judith Regan’s move to LA – a story whose significance is still somewhat unclear. Then real news came of Scholastic‘s Barbara Marcus leaving in June and being succeeded by Disney‘s Lisa Holton. Changes at Rodale include the just announced resignation of Amy Rhodes, Publisher of…Continue Reading
People The West Coast is in the news: Kirsty Melville, previously Publisher of Ten Speed Press, has become Publisher of the new book division of University Games. The new Publisher of Ten Speed is Lorena Jones. … Kevan Lyon, EVP for Wholesale Merchandising/Distribution (including PGW) at AMS, has left the company. Her duties were being…Continue Reading
“Due to fixed book prices, we Germans have 25 spaghetti cookbooks, and you poor Americans only have three,” jokes Christian Sprang, lawyer for Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels (the Association of German Publishers and Booksellers). Even though US publishers might quibble, there’s no doubt that book pricing methods are controversial around the world, and will probably…Continue Reading
People June was a relatively quiet month, though that doesn’t guarantee a quiet summer, judging from the increase of job listings on industry job boards and murmurings around town: Harold Augenbraum is leaving The Mercantile Library to become Executive Director of the National Book Foundation, effective July 12. A search committee has been formed to…Continue Reading
PEOPLE Heads rolling in and rolling out: Marco Ausenda, who comes from Touring Club Italia, will replace Antonio Polito as the head of Rizzoli US, reporting to Giulio Lattanzi. . . Jean-Marie Messier’s still running Vivendi, but of course major changes at Houghton Mifflin: Teri Kelly succeeds Wendy Strothman as SVP and head of trade…Continue Reading
PEOPLE More Random House movement: Craig Virden, who has been President of RH Children’s and before that, BDD Books for Young Readers, is leaving. Crown’s Chip Gibson will take over, with Rich Romano as his EVP. Meanwhile Jenny Frost, now heading up Random Audio (which she will continue to run), will take over Crown Publishing…Continue Reading
