The story
Founded by Bennett Cerf in 1927.1
20th century
Random House was founded in 1927 by Bennett Cerf and Donald Klopfer, two years after they acquired the Modern Library imprint 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 in the Anglophone world. Ulysses transformed Random House into a formidable publisher over the next two decades. In 1936, it acquired Smith and Haas, and Robert Haas became the third partner until retiring and selling his share back to Cerf and Klopfer in 1956. The acquisition of Smith and Haas added authors, including William Faulkner, Isak Dinesen, André Malraux, Robert Graves, 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.
In October 1959, Random House went public at $11.25 a share. This was a factor in decisions by other publishing companies, including Simon & Schuster, to later go public. American publishers Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. and Beginner Books were acquired by Random House in 1960, followed by Pantheon Books 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 in 1973. RCA sold Random House to Advance Publications in 1980. Random House began publishing audiobooks in 1985.
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 bought Random House and merged it with Bantam Doubleday Dell and it soon went global. In 1999, Random House acquired the children's audiobook publisher Listening Library, and sold its distribution division.
21st century
In 2001, Phyllis E. Grann joined Random House as vice chairman. Grann was the CEO for Putnam and had grown that house from $10 million in revenue in 1976, to more than $200 million by 1993 and without increasing their title output. A publishing insider commented, "I think maybe instead of buying a company [Random House CEO Peter Olson] bought a person."
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In 2003, Random House reentered the distribution business. During the 2008 financial crisis, the publishing industry was hit hard with weak retail sales.
In May 2008, Random House CEO Peter Olson stepped down and was replaced by Markus Dohle.
In October 2008, Doubleday, a division of Random House, announced that they would lay off 16 people, representing approximately 10% of its workforce.
In early December 2008, which 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, including Random House Publishing Group, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, and Crown Publishing Group.
Susan Kamil 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 at Doubleday, now part of Knopf Publishing Group, and Dial Press, Bantam Dell. Spiegel & Grau was moved from Doubleday over to Random House. Random House also has an entertainment production arm for film and television, Random House Studio; which released the film, One Day in 2011. The company also creates story content for media including video games, social networks on the web, and mobile platforms.
Random House is one of the largest English language publishers, and part of a group of publishers once known as the "Big 6" and now known as the "Big Five". In October 2012, Bertelsmann entered into talks with rival conglomerate Pearson plc, over the possibility of combining their respective publishing companies, Random House and Penguin Group.
On July 1, 2013, the merger was completed, and the new company emerged as 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.
In 2019, Penguin Random House acquired British children's book publisher Little Tiger Group, including Tiger Tales Press, a U.S. subsidiary, and added it to Random House Children's Books. Penguin Random House announced an agreement to purchase Boom! Studios in July 2024, where Boom! would become part of Random House Worlds.
From Wikipedia’s article on Random House, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4