This post is a summary of an email sent by James Woollam, Managing Director, to all David and Charles authors this week.
We completed the management buyout of the former F&W Media International books business just over 100 days ago. In that time there has been much work completed on transitioning the business and it is a good time to update on the progress made.
Sales and Distribution
We have renewed relationships with our distributors in English-speaking markets. In the UK this is Grantham Book Services (GBS), part of the Penguin Random House Group. In the USA our partners are Ingram Two Rivers, part of Ingram Content Group. Authors and retailers that have bought books directly from GBS in the past can continue as normal.
Marketing
We have a growing online presence and you can find us on Facebook , Twitter , Instagram and LinkedIn.
We are in constant dialogue with sales accounts to identify promotional opportunities to increase book sales and continue to look for the best online and print marketing opportunities to promote our books.
International Sales
We have reviewed, renewed and enhanced our global agent representation to sell books in English language worldwide. Books ship to Canada from Ingram Two Rivers distribution and to other territories from GBS. Foreign language rights and co-edition sales remain a key part of the business and books were well received at the recent Frankfurt Book Fair. You can see our stand at the top of this post.
New Book Publishing and the Future
The focus of our new publishing will predominantly be books that relate to creative hobbies. We will be looking to revisit, and sometimes refresh, previously published books where there is an opportunity for new editions or re-issues.
Our business will always explore opportunities that look beyond the book. This is demonstrated by our continued running of the Royal School of Needlework Online Courses website, a partnership that sees us commission online learning and video course content to reach a global needlecraft audience.
New David and Charles
We have taken on the original founding name of the company and this is meaningful to our team, our authors, our customers and our readers. Throughout its near 60 years of existence, David and Charles has been an innovative brand and we intend to continue that thread with new energy and enthusiasm.
We want to be a company that is aware of its wider responsibilities. We are currently rewriting our environmental policy so that we consider the impact of our business on the environment and take steps to reduce this as much as we can.
Finally, we are grateful for the support of our fantastic authors, our distributors and business partners through the transition period. We’re excited to now be looking forward to the future and realising all of our collective potential.