Bloomberg Publishing has reorganized its Bloomberg Press book unit, appointing John Crutcher to the newly created position of publisher. Crutcher, who cofounded Bloomberg Press seven years ago with Jared Kieling, had been director of sales and marketing. Under the restructuring, the heads of Bloomberg's editorial, marketing and rights departments (including Kieling, who remains editorial director) will report to Crutcher; they had reported to Bill Inman, editor of Bloomberg Publishing. Crutcher said his appointment as publisher will provide the press with more hands-on direction as the company expands.
To help spur growth, Bloomberg Press has named Christine Miles senior editor. Miles has edited seven Bloomberg titles while also serving as full-time editor-at-large at Bloomberg Personal Finance magazine, which was recently closed. In another editorial initiative, Kathleen Peterson, senior acquisitions editor, has also been named executive editor of a new professional finance and investing line that will be launched in 2004. She will continue to acquire nonseries titles as well.
With sales of business books in a slump, Crutcher said Bloomberg has been able to grow by diversifying its list and expanding its marketing channels. Its top-selling book last year was The New Yorker Book of Golf Cartoons, and The New Yorker Book of Baseball Cartoons is due out this spring. Other titles that sold well in 2002 were revisions of 201 Great Ideas for Your Small Business and Investing in REITs. While bookstores continue to account for the largest portion of its sales, Bloomberg's fastest growing sales channel has been special markets. The channel has become important enough that Crutcher has moved Christina Psathas from the sub-rights department to special markets, where she will be working with director of special markets Lisa Goetze.
Bloomberg will publish 22 titles this year: 17 from its own list and five Economist titles licensed from Profile Books in the U.K. It will also distribute 12 new Economist titles published by Profile (News, Nov. 18, 2002). Bloomberg's books are distributed to the book trade by Norton. The company released 10 titles in 2002, after releasing 14 titles in each of the two previous years.
