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Random House is an American book publisher and the largest general-interest paperback publisher in the world. The company has several independently managed subsidiaries around the world. It is part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by German media conglomerate
Bertelsmann Bertelsmann SE & Co. KGaA () is a German private multinational conglomerate corporation based in Gütersloh, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is one of the world's largest media conglomerates, and is also active in the service sector and ...
.


History

Random House was founded in 1927 by Bennett Cerf and
Donald Klopfer Donald Simon Klopfer (January 23, 1902 – May 30, 1986) was an American publisher, one of the founders of American publishing firm Random House, along with Bennett Cerf. Klopfer was the quiet inside businessman to Cerf's quite-visible and gregari ...
, two years after they acquired the
Modern Library The Modern Library is an American book publishing imprint and formerly the parent company of Random House. Founded in 1917 by Albert Boni and Horace Liveright as an imprint of their publishing company Boni & Liveright, Modern Library became an ...
imprint Imprint or imprinting may refer to: Entertainment * ''Imprint'' (TV series), Canadian television series * "Imprint" (''Masters of Horror''), episode of TV show ''Masters of Horror'' * ''Imprint'' (film), a 2007 independent drama/thriller film ...
from publisher Horace Liveright, which reprints classic works of literature. Cerf is quoted as saying, "We just said we were going to publish a few books on the side at random," which suggested the name Random House. In 1934 they published the first authorized edition of James Joyce's novel ''
Ulysses Ulysses is one form of the Roman name for Odysseus, a hero in ancient Greek literature. Ulysses may also refer to: People * Ulysses (given name), including a list of people with this name Places in the United States * Ulysses, Kansas * Ulysse ...
'' in the Anglophone world. ''Ulysses'' transformed Random House into a formidable publisher over the next two decades. In 1936, it absorbed the firm of Smith and Haas—Robert Haas became the third partner until retiring and selling his share back to Cerf and Klopfer in 1956—which added authors including William Faulkner, Isak Dinesen, André Malraux,
Robert Graves Captain Robert von Ranke Graves (24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985) was a British poet, historical novelist and critic. His father was Alfred Perceval Graves, a celebrated Irish poet and figure in the Gaelic revival; they were both Celtic ...
, and Jean de Brunhoff, who wrote the Babar children's books. Random House also hired editors Harry Maule, Robert Linscott, and Saxe Commins, and they brought authors such as Sinclair Lewis and Robert Penn Warren with them. Random House entered reference publishing in 1947 with the ''American College Dictionary'', which was followed in 1966 by its first unabridged
dictionary A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged alphabetically (or by radical and stroke for ideographic languages), which may include information on definitions, usage, etymologies ...
. In October 1959, Random House went public at $11.25 a share. This move drew other publishing companies, such as Simon & Schuster, to later go public. American publishers Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. and Beginner Books were acquired by Random House in 1960 and
Pantheon Books Pantheon Books is an American book publishing imprint with editorial independence. It is part of the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group.Random House, Inc. Datamonitor Company Profiles Authority: Retrieved 6/20/2007, from EBSCO Host Business Source ...
in 1961; works continue to be published under these imprints with editorial independence, such as Everyman's Library, a series of classical literature reprints. In 1965, RCA bought Random House as part of a diversification strategy. Random House acquired the paperback book publisher
Ballantine Books Ballantine Books is a major book publisher located in the United States, founded in 1952 by Ian Ballantine with his wife, Betty Ballantine. It was acquired by Random House in 1973, which in turn was acquired by Bertelsmann in 1998 and remains ...
in 1973. RCA sold Random House to
Advance Publications Advance Publications, Inc., doing business as Advance, is an American media company owned by the descendants of S.I. Newhouse Sr., Donald Newhouse and S.I. Newhouse Jr. It owns a large number of subsidiary companies, including Condé Nast, an ...
in 1980. In 1988, Random House acquired Crown Publishing Group. Also in 1988, McGraw-Hill acquired Random House's Schools and Colleges division. In 1998,
Bertelsmann AG Bertelsmann SE & Co. KGaA () is a German private multinational conglomerate corporation based in Gütersloh, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is one of the world's largest media conglomerates, and is also active in the service sector and e ...
bought Random House and merged it with Bantam Doubleday
Dell Dell is an American based technology company. It develops, sells, repairs, and supports computers and related products and services. Dell is owned by its parent company, Dell Technologies. Dell sells personal computers (PCs), servers, data ...
and it soon went global. In 1999, Random House acquired the children's audiobook publisher Listening Library. Phyllis E. Grann joined Random House as vice-chairman in 2001. Grann was the CEO for Putnam and had grown that house from $10 million in revenue in 1976, to over $200 million by 1993 and without increasing their title output. A publishing insider commented that then CEO Peter Olson was, "I think maybe instead of buying a company he bought a person." Coinciding with the 2007–2008 financial crisis, the publishing industry was hit hard with weak retail sales. In May 2008, Random House CEO Peter Olson stepped down and Bertelsmann replaced Olson with
Markus Dohle Markus Dohle (born 28 June 1968) is a German businessman. He was the chief executive officer of Penguin Random House from July 2013 to December 2022. Early life and education Markus Dohle was born on 28 June 1968 in Arnsberg. He attended the ...
. By October of that year, Doubleday, a division of Random House announced that they would lay off 16 people or about 10% of its workforce. In early December, what became known as Black Wednesday in publishing circles, many publishers including Random House took steps by restructuring their divisions and laying off employees. The reorganization consolidated and created three divisions—Random House Publishing Group, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group and Crown Publishing Group.
Susan Kamil Susan Laurie Kamil (September 16, 1949 – September 8, 2019) was the publisher (as of 2018) as well as editor-in-chief of the Random House Publishing Group. Career Susan Kamil was born in Manhattan, where she attended the High School of Music & ...
, was named editorial director for Dial Press and editor-in-chief of Random House imprints reporting to Gina Centrello, the president and publisher of the Random House Publishing Group. There were layoffs in the Doubleday imprint (now part of
Knopf Publishing Group Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. () is an American publishing house that was founded by Alfred A. Knopf Sr. and Blanche Knopf in 1915. Blanche and Alfred traveled abroad regularly and were known for publishing European, Asian, and Latin American writers i ...
) and
Dial Press The Dial Press was a publishing house founded in 1923 by Lincoln MacVeagh. The Dial Press shared a building with ''The Dial'' and Scofield Thayer worked with both. The first imprint was issued in 1924. Authors included Elizabeth Bowen, W. R. Bu ...
, Bantam Dell, and
Spiegel & Grau Spiegel & Grau was originally a publishing imprint of Penguin Random House founded by Celina Spiegel and Julie Grau in 2005. On January 25, 2019, Penguin Random House announced that the imprint was being shut down and the two founders were lea ...
were moved from Doubleday over to the Random House imprints. Random House also has an entertainment production arm for film and television, Random House Studio; one release in 2011 was '' One Day''. The company also creates story content for media including video games, social networks on the web, and mobile platforms. It is one of the largest English-language publishers, along with the group formerly known as the "Big 6", now known as the "Big Five". In October 2012, Bertelsmann entered into talks with rival conglomerate
Pearson plc Pearson plc is a British multinational corporation, multinational publishing and education company headquartered in London, England. It was founded as a construction business in the 1840s but switched to publishing in the 1920s.J. A. Spende ...
, over the possibility of combining their respective publishing companies, Random House and Penguin Group. The merger was completed on July 1, 2013, and the new company is Penguin Random House. When founded, Bertelsmann owned 53% of the joint venture while Pearson owned 47%. Pearson sold 22% of its shares to Bertelsmann in July 2017, and since April 2020, it is a wholly owned subsidiary of Bertelsmann, making Random House division again wholly owned by German parent. At the time of the acquisition the combined companies controlled 25% of the book business with more than 10,000 employees and 250 independent publishing imprints and with about $3.9 billion in annual revenues. The move to consolidate was to provide leverage against Amazon.com and battle the shrinking state of bookstores. In October 2018, Penguin Random House merged two of its most known publishing lines, Random House and the Crown Publishing Group. According to Madeline McIntosh, chief executive of Penguin Random House U.S., the two lines "will retain their distinct editorial identities."'' McIntosh explained some of the motivation behind the merger in a memo to employees, writing, "Book discovery and buying patterns continue to shift, resulting in growth opportunities in the nonfiction categories in which Crown in particular already has a strong foothold: food, lifestyle, health, wellness, business, and Christian."'' ''"We must invest even more aggressively in title-level and scaled marketing programs, capabilities and partnerships," she added.'' ''Detailing additional growth strategies, McIntosh explained of the merger, "We will need to do two things simultaneously. First, we must expand and strengthen the expert publishing teams who are specialized in and dedicated to each category. Second, we must invest even more aggressively in title-level and scaled marketing programs, capabilities, and partnerships. This will ensure that we not only maximize the sales for each individual book but also keep pace with consumer trends."'' In 2019, Penguin Random House acquired British children's book publisher Little Tiger Group (including American subsidiary Tiger Tales Press) and added it to Random House Children’s Books.


Organization


Headquarters

The publisher's main office in the United States is located at 1745 Broadway in Manhattan, in the 684-foot – 210 m
Penguin Random House Tower The Random House Tower, also known as the Park Imperial Apartments, is a 52-story mixed-use tower in Manhattan, New York City. It is owned by real estate companies SL Green Realty and Ivanhoé Cambridge, with the office portion leased as the hea ...
, completed in 2009 and spanning the entire west side of the block between West 55th Street and West 56th. Its lobby showcases floor-to-ceiling glassed-in bookcases filled with books published by the company's many imprints. Earlier addresses were 457 Madison Avenue, New York 22, NY; 20 East 57th Street, New York 22, NY; and 201 East 50th Street, New York, NY 10022.


International branches

Random House, Inc. maintains several independently managed subsidiaries around the world. The Random House Group is one of the largest general book publishing companies in the United Kingdom; it is based in London. The Group comprises five publishing companies: Cornerstone Publishing,
Vintage Publishing Vintage Books is a trade paperback publishing imprint (trade name), imprint of Penguin Random House originally established by Alfred A. Knopf in 1954. The company was purchased by Random House in April 1960, and a British division was set up in 1 ...
, Ebury Publishing, Random House Children's Publishers UK and Transworld Publishers, with more than 40 diverse imprints. Its distribution business services its own imprints as well as 60 other UK publishers. The Random House archive and library is located in Rushden in Northamptonshire. In 1989, Century Hutchinson was folded into the British Random House Group, briefly known as Random Century (1990–92), Century became an
imprint Imprint or imprinting may refer to: Entertainment * ''Imprint'' (TV series), Canadian television series * "Imprint" (''Masters of Horror''), episode of TV show ''Masters of Horror'' * ''Imprint'' (film), a 2007 independent drama/thriller film ...
of the group's Cornerstone Publishing. The Random House Group also operates branches in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa (as a joint venture under the name Random House Struik), and India as part of its overseas structure. In Australia offices are in Sydney and Melbourne. In New Zealand it is based in Glenfield, Auckland, while Random House's Indian headquarters are located in New Delhi. Verlagsgruppe Random House was established after Bertelsmann's 1998 acquisition of Random House, grouping its German imprints (until then operating as Verlagsgruppe Bertelsmann) under the new name; before April 2020, it has explicitly no legal part of the worldwide Penguin Random House company and a hundred percent subsidiary of Bertelsmann instead but de facto is led by the same management. It is the second largest book publisher in Germany with more than 40 imprints, including historic publishing houses Goldmann and Heyne Verlag, as well as C. Bertelsmann, the publishing house from which today's Bertelsmann SE & Co. KGaA would eventually evolve. Verlagsgruppe Random House is headquartered in Munich (with additional locations in Gütersloh (where Bertelsmann is headquartered), Cologne, and
Aßlar Aßlar (or Asslar, ) is a town near Wetzlar in the Lahn-Dill-Kreis in Hesse, Germany. Geography Location Aßlar lies on a foothill of the Westerwald range as well as on the river Dill, which empties into the Lahn in neighbouring Wetzlar, abou ...
), employs about 850 people, and publishes roughly 2,500 titles per year. Following the formation of Penguin Random House, a Penguin Verlag (with no legal connection to Penguin Books) was founded for the German market in 2015, as part of the Verlagsgruppe Random House. With Bertelsmann acquiring full ownership of Penguin Random House in April 2020, Verlagsgruppe Random House is being reintegrated with the main Penguin Random House company. Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial is Random House's Spanish-language division, targeting markets in Spain and Hispanic America. It is headquartered in Barcelona with locations in Argentina, Chile,
Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...
, Mexico, Venezuela, Uruguay, and the United States. From 2001 until November 2012, it was a joint venture with Italian publisher Mondadori (Random House Mondadori). Upon Bertelsmann's acquisition of Mondadori's stake in the JV, the name was kept temporarily four months. Some Spanish-language authors published by Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial include Roberto Bolaño, Javier Marías, Mario Vargas Llosa and
Guillermo Arriaga Guillermo Arriaga Jordán (; born 13 March 1958) is a Mexican author, screenwriter, director and producer. Self-defined as "a hunter who works as a writer," he is best known for his Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay and BAFTA Award fo ...
. Random House of Canada was established in 1944 as the Canadian distributor of Random House Books. In 1986 the company established its own indigenous Canadian publishing program that has become one of the most successful in Canadian history. Until January 2012, it used to hold a 25% stake in McClelland & Stewart, with the remaining 75% being controlled by the University of Toronto. It is now the sole owner of McClelland & Stewart. Takeda Random House Japan was founded in May 2003 as a joint venture between Kodansha and Random House. In 2009, Random House discontinued the joint venture. The company filed for bankruptcy on December 14, 2012. In 2006, Random House invested in Random House Korea. In 2010, Random House divested their ownership. On April 27, 2010, the company announced that Random House Australia managing director, Margie Seale, would take on the responsibilities of exploring and evaluating potential business opportunities in Asia.


Home video division


Random House Home Video

Random House Home Video was a home video unit established by Random House in 1983 as Random House Video, the publisher of Dr. Seuss's books. It was renamed a year later. Random House's home video division was currently the distributor of some shows, such as Sesame Street, The Busy World of Richard Scarry, Arthur, and The Berenstain Bears, the original 1985-1987 animated television series. In 1995, they began distributing through Sony Wonder. However, The company went dormant around 2001, but Sony Wonder still continued to used the company's logo on Arthur VHS tapes and DVDs until 2006.


See also

* Western Publishing * List of English language book publishers * List of largest UK book publishers * Media of New York City


References


External links


Official website
*
Finding aid to Random House records at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.

''Who Speaks for the Negro'' Vanderbilt documentary website
{{Authority control Book publishing companies based in New York (state) Publishing companies based in New York City Publishing companies established in 1927 1927 establishments in New York (state) Bertelsmann subsidiaries Book publishing companies of the United States 1998 mergers and acquisitions American subsidiaries of foreign companies