Table Mountain, Cape Town
This year I was lucky enough to travel to South Africa with Robert (our art director) to present our books to the Macmillan South Africa Publishing team. It is an enjoyable trip for two reasons… first, our books sell very well in South Africa so everybody is very pleased to see us and our new titles, and second… well, where better to go in the middle of a British winter than to the sun of South Africa for a week? (Not that we got outside much, honest!)
This year Robert and I travelled across the country, presenting at three road shows in Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town. Macmillan invite 50 to 60 key booksellers, librarians and press to each road show to see our latest books so it is a great way to talk directly to the people that buy, sell and use our books. We shared the stage (and a few laughs on the way) with Stuart from Pan Macmillan, Rachel from Hachette and Jane from Walker Books.
South Africa is very keen on early learning books, and that makes it such an interesting and rewarding market for us. The children of South Africa get through more Wipe Clean books per person than any other country in the world – they just cannot get enough of them! I love the idea of being involved in the early education of all those kids, it makes you feel that you are doing something really worthwhile.
So it was a great trip, and the Macmillan team in Johannesburg always amaze me with their hard work and clever ideas – they remind you that publishing is a fun business to be in. And if you look at the pictures below you will see that they are very, very good at selling books.
Roger in CNA book shop in Durban
Robert in Exclusive books in Johannesburg
