SIZING UP YOUR PUBLISHER

On 1 July 2013 a new publishing conglomerate was born: Penguin Random House (PRH). It brought together the Pearson-owned Penguin Group with the Bertelsmann-owned Random House to create the world’s biggest publisher. Then in November 2020, PRH announced plans to merge with Simon & Schuster. The biggest could be getting bigger.

With conglomerates growing ever larger, and new smaller, independent publishers launching all the time, knowing which publishers to approach can be confusing. If your dream is to be published by a traditional publisher, which is best for your writing business: targeting one of the big five mega-publishers, or approaching a smaller independent? Signing with a large publisher could make you an insignificant fish in a large ocean. Whereas, could signing with an independent publisher leave your book fighting for shelf space in a market dominated by PRH, Pan Macmillan, Hachette and Harper Collins?

I’ve been published by both large and small publishers, so I’ve seen both sides of the, sold 100,000 copies in three months is because the Hachette group who published it had the financial muscle to negotiate with book retailers about positioning it by the till points in their stores.