Dear Colleague,
In cleaning up our office to allow for much-needed renovations, we came across files from the early days of Market Partners International. It’s hard to believe — for us in particular — that MPI is now in its 30th year of business, but it’s true. We’re still in our original offices and still consulting to the publishing ecosystem, though many of our original clients have since morphed or merged.
Because no one was standing on the sidelines taking notes back then, it’s not that easy to reconstruct those early days: how our company evolved from three partners talking on our phones as we sat around one desk (and sometimes underneath when privacy was needed). Connie Sayre has happily retired to the country since then and, as many of you know, Robert Riger passed away last year. But Amy Rhodes came on board about nine years ago, and we’re now cohabiting with the folks from Book Industry Study Group, so we’ve still got our collective fingers on the pulse of the industry.
Meanwhile, in lieu of a timeline, here are one founding partner’s recollections of the highlights from our humble beginnings to today:
- In the early 1990s we were inventing what publishing consultants did, though Mike Shatzkin (our Market Cousin, as we refer to him) had already set up shop. Whenever someone called us to ask if we knew how to do x, y or z, we said, “of course.” That’s how we ended up setting up DK’s first US office and becoming expert witnesses for the FBI in its case against V.C. Andrews.
- In those early days we also decided to start a newsletter called Publishing Trends, which we mailed out to subscribers for an annual fee. In 2003 it migrated online and subscriber revenues became a thing of the past. But it’s still going strong at PublishingTrends.com
- Amazon came along as a client in 1996 and, with it, our relationship with (a then-very approachable) Jeff Bezos. Publishers and booksellers alike had little time for the upstart etailer, so our job was to introduce the company and its founder to anyone who would listen. It appears that we were successful.
- Around this time we also began getting calls about “headhunting” and, after learning the ropes from a few experienced executive recruiters , we began taking on clients. We’re now the largest trade publishing recruiter in the U.S. and have conducted searches for around thirty publishers, many of them multiple times.
- By the late 1990s the future of books was in jeopardy – at least according to endless articles in Wired and the New York Times. So, when RocketeBook came along, we were ready to adopt and promote the digital book. Martin Eberhard, who went on to found and become the first CEO of Tesla, was our brilliant, quirky client and the late, beloved Robin Seaman was one of our contacts. She then went to Gemstar TV Guide, which was owned by the notorious Henry Yuen, so we went off to work for them as well – until Yuen was charged with fraud and disappeared. We also worked for Questia, one of the first online commercial academic libraries, later sold to Cengage in 2010.
- It wasn’t all startups. We had memorable interactions with a series of clients that included Jim Henson‘s Muppet Workshop; Diana Ross; Christy Hefner, CEO of Playboy Enterprises; and – almost — Jackie Kennedy. The latter came to our offices to discuss our helping with special sales for her lifestyle line at Viking, but a loyal client who published similar books threatened to fire us if we took her on. That was a hard decision to make.
- At the turn of the millennium we also began working with nonprofits, beginning with Hazelden and moving on to behemoths like AARP and American Diabetes Association. Museum publishers like MoMA, The Met, The Getty, and the Whitney are another valued area in which we happily consult, especially when those jobs include – as is sometimes the case — private tours. We also worked with the jewelry designer Seaman Schepps, which paid us in….yes, jewelry.
- Five years ago the Booker Prize Foundation also came to us and asked if we would do a project with the consulting firm McKinsey & Company. Despite our initial misgivings, the relationship proved to be a fruitful one, and we played a small role in persuading the Foundation to consider Americans in their awards strategy. The delightful Jonathan Bays, who headed up the McKinsey side of our project, left the company to become the Executive Director for Yo Yo Ma‘s Sound Postings.
- In recent years, we’ve worked with a number of publishers to find the best distribution strategy and, along the way, we developed a publisher client satisfaction survey that has been used by several distributors. As a result, we have had the pleasure of reaching out to over 60 different publishers to hear about their business, their challenges, and their successes.
- For half a dozen years we worked with Michael Cader and Mike Shatzkin at Digital Book World, both on its children’s conference (Launch Kids) and as moderators on a range of panels. Now that it’s moved to Nashville, we’re happy to sit in the audience and just enjoy the show. This year Mike will come to speak — and our colleague, BISG’s Brian O’Leary, will be roasted.
That brings us to today, where we continue to work with the Big Five, along with small publishers, startups like Liz Gorinsky’s Erewhon Books, Radish Fiction and Vodka & Milk, along with nonprofits and the occasional Icelandic Disney licensee (Edda, a favorite). And now that we’ve shared some of our history, back to thinking about the future – and rooting through those files.
