In a move meant to reflect its broadening business interests, Parragon Publishing Inc. has restructured its operations into two divisions: Parragon Publishing and Parragon International.
Parragon's core publishing operations in the U.K, North America, and Australasia will be part of the Parragon Publishing unit headed by Paul Gregory, currently global publishing director. According to a memo from Paul Taylor, CEO of Parragon parent company DC Thomson Consumer Products, the priority for the new group will be “growth in traditional and non-traditional book markets with focus on strategic alignment across global publishing.”
Succeeding Gregory in the global publishing director role is April Sankey, the former operations director and publisher at Roto Vision SA, a division of the Quarto Group Inc. In addition, Risa Beckett, current v-p sales, Parragon North America, has been promoted to executive v-p, Parragon North America.
The second division, Parragon International, will, Taylor said, “focus on areas of our business we want to significantly expand over the next few years.” Those areas include non-English language publishing through distributors and co-edition partners; the gift market; and global marketing.
Wendy Friedman, currently president of Parragon North America/Latin America, has been promoted to president and COO, Parragon International. In this role, Friedman will oversee Parragon’s Latin American, European (excluding German language) and Asia (co-edition) teams, as well as the U.K. gift business. A new U.S. gift unit is being created--to be based in the States--that will also report to her. Brooke Lindner, previously sales and product development director of Kids Books/ Soft Play, will be joining Parragon International as director of product development.
With the promotions and restructuring, Taylor will now focus on strategic development, including looking for acquisitions outside of the traditional book space “in order to gain access to new products and distribution channels.”
