MARK ALLEN DISCUSSES GROWTH STRATEGY WITH INPUBLISHING

Wednesday, February 13, 2019 “It’s all about engaging and empowering, rather than micromanaging.” Following on from the recent acquisition of Rhinegold publishing and its portfolio of music magazines, Mark Allen spoke to Meg Carter from InPublishing about the company's rapid and continued growth over the last 5 years. Since 2013 the Mark Allen Group has increased its annual turnover from £16m to £43m and is now projecting to hit £50m this year, a year earlier than planned. In a wide ranging interview, Mark discussed how this has been achieved and what challenges this has presented to the company. “Probably what this demonstrates is that we are bucking most of the publishing trends – we seem to be doing pretty well. It is a reflection, I think, that we are not facing some of the same problems many publishers are. We all live in challenging and difficult times, so you always have to be one step ahead of where you want to be. I am not – and don’t want to sound – complacent.” The interview focused on three key elements that Mark feels are behind the company's success. Having a growth strategy that will take advantage of opportunities when they present themselves, onboarding brands in a way that empowers staff and a diversification of the business to help spread risk. “A lot of our acquisitions have been, to a large extent opportunistic. We acquire when we see magazines or brands or companies we feel we can extract more value from – in particular by developing synergies around them.” The full interview with Mark Allen is now available on InPublishing.