"The State of the Word is Good"

Many thanks to reader Francesco who alerted me to this interesting article from Publishers Weekly. Written by Marcia Z. Nelson, this piece, entitled "The State of the Word Is Good", deals with the recent publication of new translations and study Bibles, along with some info about the Catholic Bible market. Needless to say, HarperOne is prominent in this article, who, like I have mentioned before, seem to be one of the few publishers who have created attractive Bibles for Catholics. Below is a section from the article that deals with the Catholic market, but to read it in its entirety please go here.

"We've been very happy with Bible sales," says Mickey Maudlin, v-p and editorial director at HarperOne, which published several Bibles this year. "They're never the sexiest number, but they just keep going." Now HarperOne is going after the Catholic market (see p. 22), which is vast, with 67 million adherents, but difficult, because the distribution structure is less clearly delineated than the sales and distribution channels of the evangelical market. One strategy Harper has used is forging partnerships with Catholic publishers like Our Sunday Visitor, which are smaller in size but well networked through curriculum publishing. "We're very bullish about the Catholic market," Maudlin says.

I like reading that they view the Catholic market as bullish!