Britannica Group, the Chicago-based education company best known for its encyclopedias, is teaming up with What on Earth Publishing, a U.K. children’s nonfiction publisher with a U.S. arm, to launch Britannica Books, a reference imprint for young readers.
Spearheading the new venture will be What on Earth publisher Nancy Feresten and executive editor Natalie Bellos, who will join the company from Bloomsbury in October. The inaugural list will be released worldwide in fall 2020, and will publish between five and 10 titles per year for children ages three to 14.
Sal De Spirito, senior v-p of marketing and business development at Britannica Group, said in a statement, “Our goal is to help children engage deeply with content through multiple mediums, and What on Earth Publishing is the perfect partner to help us raise the bar in the print space because of our common commitment to help children find joy in learning.”
Christopher Lloyd, author and founder and CEO of What on Earth, said, “With Britannica Books, we have a unique opportunity to bring the traditions of 250 years of information-sharing about everything under (and including) the sun to a new generation of children—the adults of the future. Our books will contain between their covers the magic and diversity of reality and an invitation to explore and to question.”
