GM and the 20th Century Publishing Industry

On June 1, 2009, General Motors declared bankruptcy. GM is bankrupt because it got too used to having cultural authority. It was the top automaker in America during the twentieth century. Quite naturally, because of that success, GM grew top heavy (i.e. their systems, overhead, and debt were built during a time when they had a massive market share). Now that a number of new players have entered the game, gotten over prejudices and barriers and achieved success, GM’s share has necessarily declined. People (car buyers, diners, moviegoers, readers) have nuanced tastes. If you give them three car brands to pick from, the three auto companies will have a healthy existence. If you give them thirty brands, the profits will most certainly be more scattered. Now slide with me over to the publishing landscape.

Here's a list of the bestselling English books of the twentieth century:

The Lord of the Rings (1954)

And Then There Were None (1939)

The Hobbit (1937)

The Da Vinci Code (2003)

The Catcher in the Rye (1951)

The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care (1956)

Anne of Green Gables (1908)

The Hite Report (1976)

Charlotte's Web (1952)

The Tale of Peter Rabbit (1951)

Note that all but one of these (the enigmatic Da Vinci Code) were published pre-1980, before the modern marketplace of choice. They were released before there were more than three television channels to choose from, before our entertainment options propagated into the millions. Most of these titles will never be eclipsed, because readers now have access to millions of different reading options, and their eyeballs (and dollars) are going millions of different directions.

Now there are new nimbler, progressive, independent-minded and technology-savvy houses (like Tate Publishing, ahem) who supply readers and authors with an array of choices. We understand that the market is now more fragmented and it’s naïve at best to expect millions of readers to flock to a given book without recommendation. And so with each and every title we publish we concentrate our efforts, resources, and expertise on locating a particular book/author’s niche market, hitting that market, and then going vertical—pushing and stretching to grow that niche as high and wide as possible. And we’re succeeding.

And now the larger, conglomerate-owned houses who benefited from the relative cultural homogeny of the last century are struggling to maintain their market share in the new economy. It is shrinking, and they are experiencing the same pains the large automakers experienced when their market shrunk due to new companies and foreign competition arriving at the table.

Everyone realizes a new era has begun in publishing, and Tate Publishing is blazing the trail into the new century. (Now if only our industry can avoid a government takeover...)