Peter Usborne: The Usborne identity

When we meet in his airy office near London's Hatton Garden jewellery quarter, Peter Usborne has a boyish grin on his face. He has just had drinks with one of his heroes, Dustin Hoffman, at the National Gallery, thanks to his daughter, a film producer. It has made his day.

Usborne's charm and relaxed approach to office life make it easy to forget that he runs a ¬£33m epony-mous independent enterprise. "I have never worked hard in my life‚it's just as well I have a knack for encouraging other people to do so," he admits with a cheery smile. That said, and despite his recent 70th birthday, Usborne keeps a close eye on the day-to-day business and strategy‚and intends to keep doing so.

His company is almost unique in its spread of output‚from non-fiction, internet-linked titles and baby books to, most recently, fiction. "I don't think any children's publisher comes close to our range," he says.

It is books for early readers that are currently generating the most inhouse excitement. Already performing well in export markets, the company now wants to make its Usborne Reading Programme a leading brand in the UK. An extensive trade and consumer campaign will be launched in the spring, and there are plans to grow the series from 150 to 500 titles in three years. This multi-million-pound project is the most expensive Usborne has ever launched, thanks to the "giftbook" format: hard covers, ribbons and lavish illustrations. "These are wonderful, loveable treasures, not just books," he enthuses.

The series will help to address the "reading crisis" in this country and internationally, he says. But he also questions where this modern obsession with literacy has come from. "It is not the case that children are any worse at reading than before," he says, "but now it matters more because we are in a knowledge society rather than an industrial society. There is very little we can do without reading."

Private past

Despite his obvious passion for books, it was a series of happy accidents that first brought Usborne into children's publishing. At Oxford in the early 1960s he created a scurrilous, satirical magazine with a group of writers including Richard Ingrams and Paul Foot. After travelling to the US for work experience with magazine group Time-Life, and watching the new photolitho printing presses in action, Usborne saw greater potential for their university hobby. Five months after graduating he funded and launched Private Eye.

After four years as Private Eye's "business manager and bottlewasher", he fancied a change. He moved to the British Printing Corporation in 1967 after completing an MBA, and stepped into a role as special assistant to the m.d. (pre-Maxwell days). That lasted until his wife phoned him at the office to tell him he was going to be a father.

With typical over-enthusiasm, Usborne went to his boss and asked to do "something in children's publishing". "He sent me down the corridor to Macdonald Educational. I was given some paper and glue and told to 'make something'."

Usborne rose to the challenge, creating the template for the Macdonald Starters Knowhow books, which applied a magazine format to non-fiction subjects, making the books fun for children to browse. He would later use the same formula to launch Usborne Publishing in 1975.

Usborne gives two reasons for his company's success to date. The first is this approach to publishing, which puts the child reader at its heart. The other is its emphasis on coeditions‚languages are his natural element. "I have a French mother, did an MBA in France, am fluent in German and have learned dozens of languages. And I love the Frankfurt Book Fair."

Just a third of Usborne's turnover is from UK trade; the rest is export and coedition sales. In order to get those coedition deals, Usborne says, "You have to invest in each of the books you produce‚you have to create something that is more expensive than your partner can afford to create so that they will buy it from you rather than making it themselves."

Usborne invests from £50,000 to a staggering £250,000 in making a single book. Each is crafted inhouse, from concept to writing and design (the design team is 50-strong).

Every summer, the entire staff is requisitioned to spend up to six days hammering out ideas for the next "season". Usborne always takes part in these "completely exhausting" sessions, although editorial director Jenny Tyler now decides which ideas are taken forward, and thence to Frankfurt and Bologna.

Today, non-fiction accounts for just 15% of Usborne's turnover after difficulties in the market forced it to diversify. He cites two factors‚the growth of Dorling Kindersley ("they were flooding the market with a single look based on 'Usborne with photographs'"), and then the emergence of the internet. In 1995 he sold a 26% stake in the business to Scholastic. "I wanted some cash out of the business and I bought a property in France," he recalls. "They are my main shareholder and very supportive, and completely passive."

New babies

Usborne has, therefore, adapted its inhouse process to different kinds of books. Baby and toddler books account for 30% of sales, largely thanks to the wildly popular That's Not My . . . board books. "That wasn't my idea," Usborne admits. "In fact I opposed it, strongly. I never thought it would work."

Fiction has been another growth area, headed by Megan Larkin. And export sales, driven by Scholastic's team in Europe, have revealed an unexploited market for teaching English as a second language.

Now Usborne wants to turn the spotlight back on traditional non-fiction publishing. "I initially thought that the internet would kill non-fiction, because teachers would tell children to use the internet to help with homework. But if you key in 'castles' [on a search engine], you get 900,000 possible websites. The internet is an inadequate resource for children."

Although space that retailers devote to children's non-fiction has declined, Usborne believes it is time to address this. "People's attitudes are beginning to change. I really believe that we can bring back non-fiction and make it a success again, but that is up to the trade as much as the publishers. I hope that they will start to back non-fiction again."