The International Christian Retail Show (ICRS) is meeting this week in Atlanta (July 9-12), returning to the steamy city after two years in Denver. At the pre-show events leading up to the opening of the show floor on Monday, the talk was all about CBA’s abandonment of its winter trade show (PW Daily, July 6) and plans to launch an as-yet-undefined new event in its place. Publishers who spoke with RBL expressed relief at not having to gear up for an exhibit in January—one that had become increasingly unproductive and onerous for many in recent years—as well as curiosity about what CBA might have in mind. Without a trade exhibit, how will the association draw retailers to the event? How will it motivate publishers and other suppliers to participate? Some answers may develop over the next few days.
The week before for ICRS, Byron Williamson, who has served as executive v-p for strategic growth & development at Thomas Nelson since the company acquired Integrity Publishers in fall 2006, resigned. Williamson founded Integrity and served as president and CEO. According to a statement from Thomas Nelson, “Williamson has decided to step down from his role at Nelson to focus on developing creative media for the Christian community, which may involve authors, artists and other innovative content developers.” Before launching Integrity Williamson was president of Word Publishing and divisional president of Thomas Nelson.
Another former Nelson executive, Jonathan Merkh, has hit the ground running as the new v-p of book publishing for Guideposts Books. On Sunday night Merkh said that Guideposts has conducted extensive research this year into its direct mail database “to get a better understanding and connection with our core customers. We want to find ways to extend our brand at retail with proprietary products,” including its Daily Guideposts devotional, which has sold over 20 million copies as a total series. Merkh said that the house would also be reaching into its “vault” of fiction backlist--titles that were sold through the company’s direct mail program but “have never seen the light of day at retail.” The bulk of the publisher’s growth, Merkh predicts, will be “organic from our existing content and our direct mail.”
Also expanding its fiction offerings is Steeple Hill, whose Love Inspired Historical line will launch in February with Catherine Palmer’s medieval novel The Briton. Executive editor Joan Marlow Golan said that the line will feature two titles a month set in many different historical periods: Regency, Western, Victorian, and WWII, among others. “People are clamoring for it before it’s even out,” she said. Also new at Steeple Hill, which is part of the Harlequin family, is a corporation-wide initiative to publish women’s non-fiction as well as fiction. “We’re looking for devotionals, Christian living, anything that will appeal to large numbers of Christian women,” Golan said. “At first, we’ll probably do no more than two a year, but if it sells well we could expand our vision.”
Bethany House, one of the pioneering houses in Christian fiction, formally announced that Gary and Carol Johnson will be transitioning to part-time starting in March 2008. At the Baker author dinner on Sunday evening, CEO Dwight Baker lauded the Johnsons for their nearly 30 years of service in Christian publishing--Carol Johnson was the editor who discovered Love Comes Softly novelist Janette Oke in the 1970s--and said that while the Johnsons will be continuing part-time for the foreseeable future, a new leadership team will be announced shortly for Bethany House, which is now part of the Baker Publishing Group.
