On Monday, February 26, eight days after the crash that claimed the life of legendary NASCAR driver Dale Earnhardt, Chicago independent publisher Triumph Books shipped 230,000 copies of Dale Earnhardt: Remembering the Intimidator. The publisher has since gone back to press for 50,000 more copies, and the title debuted on the April 1 New York Times nonfiction paperback bestseller list at number one.
"We've always tried to do timely books," said Triumph president Mitchell Rogatz, who founded the company 10 years ago. "We have a very small staff—12 employees at the moment—but we work very hard. This book was unique in every respect. We try to turn things around quickly, but we've certainly never turned one around this quickly, or had a book take off to the extent that this one has."
The Earnhardt title is a glossy, four-color trade paperback that retails for $9.95. "It's not a definitive work by any means," Rogatz acknowledged. "But I honestly feel we've produced a nicely done, very respectful commemorative."
Despite the fact that Triumph has cultivated relationships with the governing bodies of virtually all the major sports—it publishes the official NCAA basketball and football record books, as well as the official rules of the National Hockey League, the National Football League and Major League Baseball—the publisher has kept a low profile. "We sort of like to operate in anonymity," Rogatz said. "We like to keep it small, do things ourselves and stay off the other guys' radar."
Triumph, which does its own sales and distribution, has a backlist of more than 60 titles. Triumph Entertainment, an imprint, specializes in low-priced "instant" pictorials on pop culture figures and phenomena.
Rogatz said it was too early to tell what the sell-through will be on the Earnhardt book, but told PW, "We certainly are excited about what's happened so far."
