CLMP, SPD Join Forces

by Calvin Reid, PW Daily -- Publishers Weekly, 6/6/2006

In the latest organizational make-over at the Council for Literary Magazines and Presses, CLMP has entered into a "strategic partnership" with nonprofit indie distributor Small Press Distribution in what they call an effort to combine resources to better serve the literary publishing community.

The partnership will take effect immediately and CLMP executive director Jeffrey Lependorf will take over as joint executive director of both organizations. Lependorf emphasized that this new effort is a partnership, "not a merger," and will not effect the CLMP or SPD boards, or the principal financial backer they both share, the National Endowment for the Arts.

Mary Shapiro, president of the SPD board, said the partnership will, "create more sustainable organizations" that will better "serve independent publishing and the literary arts." Last year, CLMP launched the Literary Ventures Fund, an unusual effort to create a venture capital fund for literary works. The fund invests in the marketing of literary titles with expectations of using the book's profits to grow the fund and support other worthy titles.

While the boards CLMP and SPD will now work more closely together, Lependorf said that both organizations will remain separate entities. CLMP and SPD are the only national nonprofits that both serve literary and nonprofit publishers. "It gives us a wider reach," Lependorf said. He said the partnership will save one salary right away with Lependorf directing both organizations; Dave Martinson, interim SPD executive director, will give up that post but remain on the board. And with SPD based in California and CLMP in New York, Lependorf said the partnership "makes us truly national organizations. It will help our fundraising and national programming."