1. Successes and Failures in Religious Publishing
Case Studies
Successes and Failures in Religious Publishing

2. What makes a successful publication?
Leads people to reflect on God, their faith, or spurs them to delve more deeply into a spiritual journey
Beautifully edited and produced
Sales
Reviews
Places a trend into a Christian perspective
Timeliness
Motivate and challenge your staff

3. The Illustrated Jerusalem Bible
Dr. Giuseppe Albaretto had an idea…
Motivated by love of the church and love of his friend, Dali… asked him to create a bible that would stimulate a love of scripture and turn peoples heart back to God
As the story goes, Dr. Giuseppe Albaretto, a devout Catholic and also Dalí’s friend and patron commissioned the watercolours as illustrations for a new edition of the Bible. Dr. Albaretto knew that the project would require Dalí to study the Bible, and he hoped this would bring his artist friend back to God. From this commission came the Biblia Sacra, as series of surreal depictions of key themes from the Bible painted between 1963 and 1964.
The Biblia Sacra suite comprises 105 colour lithographs after the watercolour paintings created by Dalí. Each lithograph comes with text from the Bible. They were first published by Rizzoli and then by Doubleday.

4. The Illustrated Jerusalem Bible
First released at $99.95 in the early 70’s they languished until they closed them out at $ Looking on ebay now they sell for regularly $ or more. Was this a success or a failure? It was a success because it added to the understanding of scripture and the intersection of art… from a contemporary point of view versus a classical understanding.

5. Sun Moon Star
In 1980, friends at Harper Row San Francisco showed me a preview of a child’s Christmas Story book written by Kurt Vonnegut with illustrations by Ivan Chermayeff. This was a product dreamed up by Harper New York and it completely missed where the market was going. It might have been a different story if the Children’s Editors had been able to collaborate. Needless to say this book did not sell and you can know purchase a copy of $1.52 on line. Though you can hear Kurt reading it aloud on youtube.

6. With Heart and Voices An author had an idea Researched new marketplace
Identified potential buyers and their positions
Did multiple print campaigns and…
I thought this was going to be a homerun. There are more than 600 Senior Housing developments in Chicago within a15 mile radius of Chicago compared to 351 Churches in Archdiocese in a 25 mile radius. But I didn’t truly understand that elder seniors do not even look at a book when singing hymns and though I had done cursory study a key understanding of this unusual marketplace eluded me.

7. FAILURE What did we learn? How did we recover our investment?
After two national campaigns and selling more Seasonal Missalettes ® than With Hearts and Voices, we abandoned the marketing. The team decided to use the recordings as digital files on itunes. As they quickly became some of our bestselling music, we returned to the product, re-branded it and now sell it as Catholic Traditions.

8. Repackaging Editing Reintroduced as an electronic product and then created the CDs
Compiled the best Catholic songs with an eye to songs no one else had available
Recorded all the prayers so people could play them and recite along with the CD
Made individual tracks available as downloads

9. Ancient Echoes
World Music trend Interest in both education and spirituality markets Had a hunch
I knew this would generate interest from the general media which really made me want to publish it. It was a gamble and we won.

10. Number one on Amazon The right PR company Preparing our artists LUCK
Kingdom of Heaven licensing
We made the decision to invest heavily in this product and gave us national expousure in the secular marketplace. The marketing team benefited greatly from the challenge of working in a larger market and World Library Publications had a great financial success on their hands.

11. LOVE IS OUR MISSION: POPE FRANCIS IN AMERICA
Challenged book and magazine staffs to work together.
Worked under a very short deadline
Original print run 40,000
Reprinted two more times
Caused us to reorganized our staffs and workflow because of the success of this publication

12. The St John Bible
In 1996, the Queen of England's calligrapher and longtime friend of the abbey, Donald Jackson, suggested to Fr. Eric Hollas that Saint John's should sponsor him to complete a handwritten Bible using parchment and quill. Fr. Eric brought the idea to Saint John's University president, Br. Dietrich Reinhart, who in turn raised the possibility with Abbot Timothy Kelly. It did not take long for the monastic community as well as monastic and non-monastic faculty members and Donald Jackson to begin work on the project. From the get-go The Saint John's Bible has been a grand collaboration between artists, calligraphers, theologians, historians, and scholars stretching across the Atlantic.
Explore the Saint John's Bible
In 1998, Saint John's Abbey and University commissioned renowned calligrapher Donald Jackson to produce a hand-written, hand-illuminated Bible. We invite you to explore this work of art that unites an ancient Benedictine tradition with the technology and vision of today, illuminating the Word of God for a new millennium.
Explore the Saint John's Bible Website
A1MSF.jpgJust as the Bible set the direction for the first two-thousand years of Christian history, the purpose of The Saint John's Bible has been to shape and guide the Christian message for the third millennium
NPR Scott Simon Weekend Edition, Krista Tippet On Being

13. Additional Publishing opportunities
Three distinct books serving very different constituencies

14. Other products
Premium Featured Prints, or your own custom print, Copies or as inexpensive as notecards. Serving a broad marketplace and at the same time strong branding opportunities.

15. Dear Pope Francis
Released in February 2016 and is still number 2 on Amazon
#2 in Books > Christian Books & Bibles > Ministry & Evangelism > Children's Ministry
#35 in Books > Christian Books & Bibles > Catholicism
#52 in Books > Children's Books > Religions > Christianity

16. Using media to tell the story
And positions those stories into their own website

17. Success into Failure
Ask anyone who was in publishing 20 years ago November The Catechism was selling at $19.95 and no one could keep it in stock.
Everyone was sold out before Christmas and reprints were ordered numbering somewhere at 50,000. The USCCB publishing office did a switch on the publishers and Doubleday Image released a paperback version on April 15, 1995 which promptly killed any interest in the larger and more expensive version.