The NFL's decision to revamp its book-publishing model has turned a break-even business into one that sources said will generate profits in the low seven figures.
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| H.O. Zimman did this year’s Super Bowl program. |
The league more than a year ago decided it would be better off if it outsourced its Super Bowl program and other publications to a third-party publisher that could produce a better editorial product in a more timely manner, according to Chris Russo, the NFL's senior vice president of new media. So the league scrapped its old model, which consisted of the in-house production of one profitable publication — the Super Bowl program — and a bunch of money-losers, including several coffee table books and a quasi-monthly magazine called NFL Insider.
The league put Boston-based publisher H.O. Zimman in charge of producing the 500,000 Super Bowl programs that went on sale last week. It tapped New York-based Scholastic and DK Publishing, a British publishing company, to produce more than a dozen books targeted toward children.
The economic results, while small change by NFL standards, have nonetheless been substantial and immediate. The Super Bowl program, which last year had 40 ad pages, has 56 pages this year that sold for an estimated $50,000 a page, Russo said.
"We moved from a model that wasn't making money to a model that is profitable," said Russo, who declined to provide dollar figures.
