Effective January 1, the newly formed Macmillan Children's Publishing Group will bring together the seven children's book companies of Macmillan. Dan Farley has been named president of the new group, and Jean Feiwel and Simon Boughton have been named senior v-ps and publishing directors.
Feiwel will continue as publisher of Feiwel and Friends and Square Fish and also oversee Holt Books for Young Readers and Priddy Books. Boughton will continue as publisher of Roaring Brook Press and the graphic novel imprint First Second and will become publisher of Farrar, Straus and Giroux Books for Young Readers.
Farley will recruit a senior marketing executive to direct the Macmillan Children's Group publicity and marketing efforts.
In a statement, Farley said, "A consolidated marketing group will provide energetic and innovative support for all of Macmillan Children's publishing, featuring publicity, targeted marketing including educational, institutional, online, and retail, along with advertising, sales promotion, and other functions. Yet we will remain no less committed to our distinct imprint identities; editorial vision and our title development performance remain the creative core of our business and crucial for our success."
As part of the consolidation, Michael Eisenberg, associate publisher of FSG BFYR, Melanie Kroupa, who headed her own imprint at FSG BFYR, and Jennifer Abbots, associate director of publicity at Holt Books for Young Readers were among the Macmillan children's employees whose jobs were eliminated.
"It's a hard thing, this combination of economic realities that coincided with [the changes in the children's book area--about which] we've been having conversations for a year," Jean Feiwel told Shelf Awareness. "I think, and Dan Farley has said this, too, that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. We needed to join forces in order to be competitive in this marketplace."