Zondervan Sells Brazilian Publishing Unit

by Juli Cragg Hilliard, Religion BookLine -- Publishers Weekly, 2/14/2007

Zondervan said this week it is selling its São Paolo-based Editora Vida Ltda. just three weeks after Thomas Nelson announced a new publishing division in Brazil.

"We're not getting out of Brazil," said Doug Lockhart, Zondervan's president and CEO. "We're getting out of the business model that we've been in for the last 10 years." With the sale of the Portuguese-language division to an affiliate of Producciones Peniel SRL of Argentina, Zondervan products will still be available in the Brazilian market, he said.

"It allows us to be in the country without having a dedicated business with 60 people down there," Lockhart said. "Our go-to-market strategy has just changed."

Lockhart said Zondervan has "a high comfort level" with Peniel, a distribution partner for seven years. Peniel will have distribution and publishing rights to Editora Vida products, and Zondervan will continue to license products to Peniel. (Zondervan is keeping its Spanish-language Vida Publishers division, which is based in Miami.)

While Zondervan had gone it alone in Brazil, competing evangelical Christian house Nelson has opened the new Thomas Nelson Brasil publishing group, based in Rio de Janeiro, in a joint venture with Ediouro Publicações.

Tod Shuttleworth, Nelson senior v-p of global publishing, said the publisher looks to expand in markets with growing economies as well as vibrant evangelical populations—"and Brazil offers both."

Shuttleworth said the startup phase of operations there has surpassed Nelson's expectations. "Early on, we're very happy," he said. "The demographics align extremely well with the people who like to buy our products."

Words of wisdom for Nelson from Zondervan? Lockhart said, "Anytime there's a new market entry, there certainly are both business opportunities and challenges. And we wish them luck."