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Thompson and Randles step up at Scholastic

09.07.08 Caroline Horn

Scholastic UK has appointed Steve Thompson as head of its book fairs operation and Julie Randles as head of its book clubs.

The appointments follow Scholastic's decision in February to split its book club and book fair operations into separate businesses, which led to the departure of m.d. Miles Stevens-Hoare and group operations director Jes Pepper.

Thompson, who has worked for Scholastic for 13 years, described the current economic climate as "tough". He hopes to grow sales by encouraging schools to hold more book fairs each year by promoting different themes each term, and improving the financial terms schools are offered.

Scholastic Book Fairs will also develop its online offer for schools by making more editorial content available, and improving the online administration of bookfairs, he added.

Julie Randles, who has run Scholastic's Book Clubs and Book Fairs production selection team for three years, said that web developments would form "a large part" of future plans for development of Scholastic's club offer.

She added: "We have significantly improved the profitability of the clubs business and sold 30% more books this year than in 2006/07. That means we have increased the number of books we have given to schools on the back of the books sold through the clubs, and we intend to improve our schools offer further."

Caroline Horn children's Scholastic

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