When you have an iconic 80-year-old company such as Hostess going out of business you pause for a moment, first to lament that Twinkies and hostess Cupcakes will cease to be, and that 18,000 people will be unemployed. Then you wonder: How could that be? How could brands like Wonder Bread just disappear after being a household name for several generations? How does something so popular just get erased as if it never existed?
Could the same thing happen with book publishers?
It is a logical question to raise, given that a few years ago one would have thought it crazy to imagine major food brands closing shop after such a long, successful run. But we know all businesses, with the exception of a few, eventually close up shop. It is just the Darwinian way of the business world.
As hard as it may seem that brands like Simon & Schuster, Random House, or Wiley could ever go out of business, we see mergers eat up brands and bankruptcies completely kill them. Publishing certainly is not immune to the economic laws of the land. And unfortunately, publishing as an industry, is under attack from new mediums such as the Internet.
Maybe a big publisher can merge with Hostess and form a new entity, one that offers tasty snacks while you read a good book.
Brian Feinblum’s views, opinions, and ideas expressed in this blog are his alone and not that of his employer, the nation’s largest book promoter. You can follow him on Twitter @theprexpert and email him at brianfeinblum@gmail.com. He feels more important when discussed in the third-person. This blog is copyrighted material by BookMarketingBuzzBlog 2012 ©
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