• Skip to main content
  • Skip to after header navigation
  • Skip to site footer

The Steve Laube Agency

Helping to Change the World…Word by Word

The Steve Laube Agency

The Steve Laube Agency

Helping to Change the World Word by Word

  • Home
  • About
    • Who We Are
    • Frequently Asked Questions
    • Interview with Steve Laube
    • Statement of Faith
    • Terms and Conditions
    • Privacy Policy
  • Guidelines
  • Authors
    • Who We Represent
    • Awards and Recognition
  • Resources
    • Recommended Reading
    • Christian Writers Market Guide Online
    • Christian Writers Institute
    • Writers Conferences
    • Freelance Editorial Services
    • Copyright Resources
    • Research Tools
    • Selling What You Write
  • Blog
  • Contact
  • Twitter
  • FaceBook
  • RSS Feed
  • Get Published
  • Book Proposals
  • Book Business
  • Writing Craft
    • Conferences
    • Copyright
    • Craft
    • Creativity
    • Grammar
  • Fun Fridays
Home » Defense of Traditional Publishing

Defense of Traditional Publishing

Who Owns Whom in Publishing?

By Steve Laubeon August 14, 2023
Share
Tweet
71

Updated August 2023 (first created November 2011)

For a comprehensive list, check out The Christian Writers Market Guide. Available in print at your favorite retailer or as an online subscription (updated frequently) at www.ChristianWritersMarketGuide.com.

My emphasis in this post is the Christian publishing industry. There are many fine commercial publishers that do not publish Christian books and thus are left out of this discussion. First, let us review what is known as The Big Five. These five major conglomerates control a sizable portion of the marketplace. (Take a look at this fascinating graphic of all the imprints of the Big Five.)

Who are these big five? In no particular order:

1. HarperCollins is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s media conglomerate News Corp. HarperCollins has around fifty imprints. Zondervan had been their sole evangelical Christian imprint until they bought Thomas Nelson Publishers in 2012. The two are combined under the HarperCollins Christian Publishing group. Under that HCCP group, they have multiple imprints: Zondervan, Zonderkidz, Thomas Nelson, Tommy Nelson (children’s), W Publishing, Emanate Books, and Harper Focus. (There are also an academic division, a curriculum division, and a Bible division.) In addition, HarperCollins keeps a separate religious publishing imprint called HarperOne (formerly HarperSanFrancisco). News Corp. is the parent company of 20th Century Fox, the film company with numerous divisions, including several Fox television networks. In 2013 the print/publishing division was spun off from the entertainment division. In 2014 HarperCollins bought Harlequin Enterprises. This includes the Love Inspired imprint, which is the Christian fiction division of Harlequin.

A little trivia for you. ABC (the TV network) used to own Word Entertainment, which included Word Books and Word Music, which was a well-known Christian company. Word Entertainment was purchased by Thomas Nelson in 1992. Nelson later sold the Word Music division to Gaylord Entertainment, the folks who own Opryland. As part of the sale, the brand name “Word” went with the music division. The book division was then renamed W Publishing. The book and Bible publisher, Thomas Nelson, was bought out by a private equity firm in 2006, sold to another private equity firm in 2010, and then to HarperCollins in 2012.

Quoting parts of an article in the New York Times: In March 2021, “HarperCollins bought Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Books and Media, the trade publishing division of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, for $349 million…. Houghton Mifflin publishes perennial sellers by well-known authors such as J.R.R. Tolkien, George Orwell, Robert Penn Warren, Philip Roth and Lois Lowry, as well as children’s classics and best-selling cookbooks and lifestyle guides.”

2. Hachette Book Group, formerly Warner Books (of Time Warner), was acquired by Hachette Livre, a French media conglomerate Lagardère Group subsidiary. Their Christian imprints include FaithWords and Worthy Publishing (which they bought in 2018). Other well-known, general-market imprints include Little Brown, Grand Central, and Center Street.

3. Penguin Random House is a 2013 merger of two huge book publishing groups, Penguin and Random House (often abbreviated as PRH).

Bertelsmann is a German media conglomerate that owns Penguin Random House, the world’s largest English-language publisher. They have several divisions and over 300 imprints.

As of this update, the Christian-oriented imprints include WaterBrook, Multnomah, Convergent, and Image. These are currently under the Random House Division within PRH as a separate and distinct group. Also, WaterBrook and Multnomah have separate editorial and marketing teams from Convergent and Image in Colorado Springs and New York, respectively.

4. Simon & Schuster is owned by KKR, a private equity firm (purchased by KKR in August 2023).  Their Christian imprint is Howard Books, which is a division of Atria. Other well-known imprints include Pocket, Free Press, and Scribner. In 2017 the Nashville office of Howard Books was shuttered, and operations moved to New York under more direct management by Atria. I wrote about this event at this link.

In November 2020, it was announced that Penguin Random House had won the bid to buy the Simon and Schuster division from Paramount Global, which includes ViacomCBS (the media conglomerate), for $2.2 billion in cash. The U.S. Department of Justice sued to stop the merger, citing antitrust laws. In late October 2022, the court ruled against the merger. PRH had to pay a $200 million termination fee.

In August 2023, KKR, a private equity firm, bought S&S for $1.62 billion in an all-cash transaction. According to the press release, KKR has a history of investing in content-oriented media businesses, including current and prior investments in Epic Games, Mediawan, Leonine Studios, Artlist, Skydance Media, BMG, and RBmedia, among others. (KKR stands for Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., LP.)

5. Holtzbrinck Publishing Group is owned by the German Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Group. It’s primarily known in the U.S. as MacMillan. It does not have a specifically Christian-oriented imprint, but does have strong commercial imprints like St. Martin’s, Tor, and Farrar, Straus, & Giroux.

Not one of the big five, but still significant, is Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (HMH). The education publisher was purchased in April 2022 by a private equity firm, Veritas Capital, for $2.8 billion. A focus of their publishing is K-12 educational resources. Their general trade division was purchased by HarperCollins the previous year (see above).

What about the rest of the Christian publishing industry?

Christian publishers still independently and/or family-owned include:
The Baker Publishing Group (including Bethany House, Revell, Baker, Baker Academic, Brazos, and Chosen, all owned by the Baker family. Jesse Myers is the CEO as of mid-2023. (He is the first non-Baker family CEO of the publishing company.)
Barbour Publishing (Mary Burns is the president. In July 2017 the company became employee owned and operated.)
Broadstreet Publishing (Carlton Garborg)
Charisma House (part of the Charisma Media Group owned by Stephen Strang)
Crossway (a nonprofit publishing ministry of Good News Publishers, founded by the Dennis Family)
Eerdmans (the Eerdmans family)
Elk Lake Publishing
(The Haggerty family)
The Good Book Company (Based in Epsom, Surrey, England, it has acquisitions and editorial in the U.S. in North Carolina.)
Group Publishing
 (Thom and Joani Schultz)
Harvest House (Bob Hawkins, Jr.)
Iron Stream Media (John Herring, president, and CEO. The company bought New Hope Publishers in 2017, Lighthouse of the Carolinas in 2019, and Brookstone in 2021)
Kregel Publishing (the Kregel family)
New Leaf Publishing Group (includes Master Books and New Leaf Press)
Oasis Family Media (includes Oasis Audio, Sky Turtle Press, and Enclave Publishing) 
P&R Publishing
(The P and R stand for Presbyterian and Reformed.)
Salem Books (the Christian imprint of Regnery Publishing)
Tyndale House Publishers (a part of the Tyndale House Foundation formed by founder Ken Taylor and his family. Bought Hendrickson Publishers, another family-owned business, in 2021. Hendrickson also includes Rose and Aspire imprints.)
Whitaker House (Bob Whitaker, Jr.)

Then there are Christian publishers owned by a larger organization or ministry. For example:
1517 Media is owned by Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). They have multiple divisions: Augsburg Fortress, Fortress Press, Sparkhouse, and Beaming Books.
Abingdon is an imprint of The United Methodist Publishing House.
AMG
is owned by AMG International (a missions organization). Their best-known author is Spiro Zodiahtes. AMG stands for American Mission to the Greeks.
B&H Publishing Group
is owned by Lifeway Christian Resources (aka the Southern Baptist Convention). And if your memory is long, B&H stands for Broadman and Holman. In 2015 there was a move to merge the Lifeway resources division (education and curriculum) into a tighter integration with B&H. Eventually, the Lifeway name will become more prominent as new products are developed. For now, the B&H imprint remains unchanged as their trade books and Bibles division.
CLC is the publishing arm of Christian Literature Crusade.
David C. Cook is part of a large nonprofit organization that distributes literature around the world. (Purchased Scripture Press and Victor Books in 1995, then the curriculum divisions of Gospel Light and Standard publishing in late 2015 to become the largest evangelical, nondenominational curriculum publisher in the U.S. Their trade book division still publishes regularly.) They also own Kingsway and Integrity Music.
Concordia is owned by the Missouri Synod Lutheran Church.
Focus on the Family Publishing is a part of the larger media ministry of Focus on the Family founded by James Dobson. Their production, marketing, and sales are handled by Tyndale, but continue to run their own acquisitions.
Foundry Publishing is the publishing arm of the Nazarene Publishing House (the publishing arm used to be called Beacon Hill Press).
Guideposts is a nonprofit organization. Their trade book division was shuttered in 2013, but they continue to publish books intended for direct-to-consumer sales (book clubs or continuity subscription series).
Gospel Publishing House is the publishing arm of the Assemblies of God.
InterVarsity Press (IVP) is part of a parachurch organization, InterVarsity.
Leafwood Books is a division of Abilene Christian University Press.
Moody Publishing is owned by The Moody Bible Institute.
NavPress is owned by a parachurch organization, the Navigators. In 2013 they signed an agreement with Tyndale House to move all production, marketing, and sales to the Tyndale organization. Acquisitions are still handled by NavPress.
Our Daily Bread Publishing is owned by Our Daily Bread Ministries. The publishing arm used to be known as Discovery House Publishing.
Paraclete Press is owned by the Community of Jesus.
Plough Publishing is owned by the Bruderhof Christian Communities.
Standard Publishing (no longer in business), founded in 1872, had been connected to The Christian Church denomination (especially with their curriculum, which was sold to David C. Cook in 2015) but was publicly owned by Standex Corp (on the NY Stock exchange) until 2006 when it was bought by the Wicks Group, a private equity firm. I’m not sure where their book properties ended up. The balance of their intellectual property (two magazines) was bought by Christian Standard Media. So Standard Publishing Company is no more.
[I continue to list Standard here because I had a personal connection with them early in my career. They shared a parent company that owned the Berean Christian Stores where I spent my first 11 years in the industry. The headquarters were in the Standard Publishing building in Cincinnati.]
Warner Press (not to be confused with the former Warner Books) is owned by the Church of God, Anderson, IN.
Westminster/John Knox is owned by the Presbyterian Publishing Corporation.
YWAM Publishing is the publishing division of Youth With a Mission.

If I have left out someone, I apologize. I am not trying to duplicate The Christian Writer’s Market Guide. Merely trying to show that there are several publishers in the Christian industry that the corporate giants do not own.

And if I have something wrong with this list, let me know; and I’ll correct it as soon as possible.

Leave a Comment
Category: Book Business, Defense of Traditional Publishing, Get Published, The Publishing LifeTag: Book Business, The Publishing Life, Traditional Publishing

Thanking the Publishers

By Tamela Hancock Murrayon September 24, 2015
Share
Tweet
11

When you’re an agent, you get to see a lot of what publishers do every day. At the same time, because you don’t actually work in their offices, you don’t know a lot about what they do. Since I’ve been an agent a long time, I don’t need to write a blog like this to butter up the publishers. They already know me. But because there’s such publisher bashing, I think now’s a good time to consider what …

Read moreThanking the Publishers
Category: Book Business, Defense of Traditional Publishing, The Publishing LifeTag: publishers, Thanks, The Publishing Life, Traditional Publishing

How Many People Are Involved in Publishing Your Book?

By Steve Laubeon May 18, 2015
Share
Tweet
13

The above photo is somewhat illustrative of the number of people involved in getting your book to market. Even if you self-publish there are still many functions that you may have not done yourself. Below is not an exhaustive list but a rambling stream of consciousness when thinking about the people who are involved in the publishing process: Author (kinda important) literary agent (we think this …

Read moreHow Many People Are Involved in Publishing Your Book?
Category: Book Business, Book Business, Defense of Traditional Publishing, Marketing, The Publishing LifeTag: Book Business, Traditional Publishing

Ebook-Originals, the Next Step in Traditional Publishing Strategy

By Steve Laubeon July 19, 2012
Share
Tweet
30

Guest Post by Sue Brower

Our guest today is Sue Brower. She is Executive Editor at Zondervan in charge of fiction and thinks she has the best job in the world…she gets paid to read all day!  Zondervan is currently looking for completed manuscripts to fill the Zondervan First fiction eBook platform.  The ideal stories will primarily have romance-driven plots and vivid, realistic characters.  We …

Read moreEbook-Originals, the Next Step in Traditional Publishing Strategy
Category: Book Business, Book Proposals, Defense of Traditional Publishing, E-Books, Get Published, TrendsTag: ebooks, publishing, Strategy

Inside a Publishing Company

By Steve Laubeon June 18, 2012
Share
Tweet
11

by Steve Laube

I just returned from three days at the Write! Canada writers conference outside Toronto. During my time there I presented a six session lecture series on the Complete Publishing Process: From Idea to Print.

When the entire process is compressed into a short series like that it becomes evident how many people are involved in the publishing of a book at any given publishing …

Read moreInside a Publishing Company
Category: Book Business, Defense of Traditional Publishing, Marketing, Steve, The Publishing LifeTag: publishing, Publishing A-Z

Goodbye to Traditional Publishing?

By Steve Laubeon May 14, 2012
Share
Tweet
82

by Steve Laube

Recently Ann Voss Peterson wrote of her decision to never sign another contract with Harlequin. One major statistic from the article is that she sold 170,000 copies of a book but earned only $20,000.

Multiple clients sent me Peterson’s “Harlequin Fail” article and wanted my opinion. My first thought is that this was typical “the publisher is ripping me off” fodder. But …

Read moreGoodbye to Traditional Publishing?
Category: Book Business, Contracts, Defense of Traditional Publishing, E-Books, Steve, TrendsTag: Contracts, royalties, Traditional Publishing

A Defense of Traditional Publishing: Part Five

By Steve Laubeon May 10, 2011
Share
Tweet10
16

INFRASTRUCTURE

The more I write on this series the more “boring” it seems to become. Why? Because I’m not revealing anything particularly new or uncovering the secret to getting published. However, the goal has been to talk about things that the traditional can do quite well. And this series ultimately is a journey through the innards of the publishing business.

Today we discuss …

Read moreA Defense of Traditional Publishing: Part Five
Category: Book Business, Defense of Traditional Publishing, Get Published, The Publishing LifeTag: Get Published, Traditional Publishing

A Defense of Traditional Publishing: Part Four

By Steve Laubeon May 3, 2011
Share
Tweet
14

DESIGN

Napoleon Bonaparte, is supposed to have said, "Un bon croquis vaut mieux qu'un long discours," translated "A good sketch is better than a long speech." That has morphed into the modern phrase “A picture is worth a thousand words,” which is a fundamental truth when talking of book covers.

Another cliché states, “don’t judge a book by its cover,” but we do it all the time. We are a …

Read moreA Defense of Traditional Publishing: Part Four
Category: Book Business, Defense of Traditional Publishing, Get Published, The Publishing LifeTag: Get Published, Traditional Publishing

A Defense of Traditional Publishing: Part Three

By Steve Laubeon April 26, 2011
Share
Tweet
20

CONTENT DEVELOPMENT

I need to clarify what I’m attempting to do with this series of posts. I am not digging deeper trenches and pouring the dirt over a head that is already buried in the sand. Some think I’m defending a dying industry and failing to see the changes around it. This series is merely an attempt to remind us what traditional publishers do well. Their critics are jettisoning all of …

Read moreA Defense of Traditional Publishing: Part Three
Category: Book Business, Defense of Traditional Publishing, The Publishing LifeTag: Content Development, publishing, Traditional Publishing

A Defense of Traditional Publishing: Part Two

By Steve Laubeon April 20, 2011
Share
Tweet
25

CURATION

The word "curation" embodies one of the key activities of a traditional publisher. My understanding of this word has been forever enriched by Steven Rosenbaum, the author of the fantastic book Curation Nation: Why the Future of Content is Context. (You owe it to yourself to read this book.)

We usually associate the curator with a museum.

Read moreA Defense of Traditional Publishing: Part Two
Category: Book Business, Book Review, Defense of Traditional Publishing, Get Published, The Publishing LifeTag: Agents, Book Business, Digital Books, E-Books, Get Published, Traditional Publishing, Trends
  • Page 1
  • Page 2
  • Next
  • Home
  • About
    • Who We Are
    • Frequently Asked Questions
    • Interview with Steve Laube
    • Statement of Faith
    • Terms and Conditions
    • Privacy Policy
  • Guidelines
  • Authors
    • Who We Represent
    • Awards and Recognition
  • Resources
    • Recommended Reading
    • Christian Writers Market Guide Online
    • Christian Writers Institute
    • Writers Conferences
    • Freelance Editorial Services
    • Copyright Resources
    • Research Tools
    • Selling What You Write
  • Blog
  • Contact

Copyright © 2025 · The Steve Laube Agency · All Rights Reserved · Website by Stormhill Media