Perseus's Distribution Goes Int'l

by Rachel Deahl, PW Daily -- Publishers Weekly, 6/4/2007

The Perseus Book Group is now offering its distribution clients more international attention. The company has brought the PGW International sales team on board to consolidate sales efforts for a number of its clients and imprints abroad. A new group, made up of international staffers from PGW and Perseus, will now handle worldwide sales outside of North America for all Perseus imprints as well as PGW clients. The intention, "over time," according to the publisher/distributor, is to offer the services of this new group to "all interested independent publishers" Perseus serves, including those with Consortium.

Chitra Bopardikar, v-p of international sales at PGW, will head the new international team along with sales directors Suk Lee and Edward Benitez. And Moira McCann, Perseus's director of sales and marketing in the U.K. and Europe, will also be part of the group. Both Bopardikar and McCann will now report to Carolyn Savarse, group v-p of the Perseus Book Group.

The Perseus imprints Basic Books, Da Capo Press, Public Affairs and Running Press, which are currently represented abroad by Penguin Group International, will start being handled by the Perseus/PGW team on December 31, 2007.