'South Beach' Drives Rodale Gains

by Raya Kuzyk -- Publishers Weekly, 8/23/2004

The continuing success of the South Beach Diet franchise has helped bump up Rodale's overall revenues 28% for the first half of 2004. Rodale's book group, which had a strong first half of 2003, was a major contributor to this year's gains, with worldwide book sales up 61%. The South Beach Diet, The South Beach Diet Good Fats/Good Carbs Guide and The South Beach Diet Cookbook have a combined 13 million copies in print and continue to hit various national bestseller lists.

But South Beach is only partly responsible for Rodale's recent gains. Other strong sellers at retail include David Zinczenko's The Abs Diet, Deirdre Imus's The Imus Ranch: Cooking for Kids and Cowboys and Dr. Isadore Rosenfeld's Breakthrough Health. In Rodale's direct marketing unit, Prevention's Sugar Solution by Sari Harrar, The Abs Diet and Stokes Backyard Bird Book by Donald and Lillian Stokes have sold well. A new title that has had a good start in the third quarter is Lance Armstrong: Images of a Champion, which was simultaneously released in the U.S., the U.K. and Holland, and is currently a bestseller in the U.K.

Another contributor to the first half gains was Rodale's international unit. Reorganized in January under the direction of Gianni Crespi, overseas book sales rose by more than 41% in the first half of 2004.