There have been a host of promotions and hires over the last month or so, and here’s our big catch up on everyone.
First, old news but Gina Gagliano’s Random House Graphic imprint made two hires – the editorial job was one of the most hotly watched in recent memory.
WHITNEY LEOPARD joins the Random House Children’s Books team as the Senior Editor for Random House Graphic. Leopard was previously an Editor at BOOM! Studios. Leopard previously oversaw Boom’s KaBOOM! kids imprint – so a big shift there!
And PATRICK CROTTY signed on as Designer for Random House Graphic. I wondered how this would affect Crotty’s position at the much loved indie Peow Studio. I reached out and Crotty told me that “Peow is still going to keep making books. We’ve set up our publication to be extra flexible, and we have very low overhead and do all our own distrobution, we don’t need to meet specific sales numbers or quartlery release release numbers, we can release smaller number of titles each year. Also, since the type of books Peow makes are aimed for older audience, different art, and content we’re not really competing so it’s all good.”
And at Random House, BEN APPLEGATE has been promoted to Director of Publishing Services, where he’ll oversee the company’s publishing with partner companies, including Kodansha’s U.S. manga releases.
Over at Marvel there were a ton of promotions, via email and Newsarama:
Rickey Purdin has been promoted to director of talent relations at Marvel Comics, leading talent acquisition and scouting for the company’s various books and series.
Jordan D. White has been promoted to senior editor at Marvel Comics, leading editorial for all X-Men titles.
Darren Shan has been promoted to editor at Marvel Comics, overseeing cosmic and various mutant titles.
Mark Basso has been promoted to editor at Marvel Comics, overseeing Conan titles, League of Legends titles, and a variety of other books.
Bill Rosemann was named Vice President of Marvel’s games division, adding on to his previous role as Creative Director.
At Marel Games, Eric Monacelli has been promoted from Senior Producer to Director of Production.
- Stephanie Hocutt has been promoted to Digital Marketing Lead. Prior to joining BOOM! Studios in 2013 as PR Assistant, Hocutt worked in comic book retail at Collector’s Paradise in Pasadena, CA. In her time at BOOM! Studios, she has taken on a variety of duties within the marketing department including working with press and hosting BOOM! Studios’ first video show Buzz on BOOM!.
- Jose Meza has been promoted to Live Events Lead. Soon after joining the company in 2012 as an intern, Meza was promoted to Sales Assistant in 2013. Early in his career, Meza oversaw BOOM! Studios’ in-house inventory management, e-commerce fulfillment, and customer service.
- Sophie Philips-Roberts has been promoted to Associate Editor. Since joining BOOM! Studios in 2016, Philips-Roberts has worked directly underBOOM! Box Senior Editor, Shannon Watters on numerous award-winning, best-selling titles including Lumberjanes, Giant Days, Fence, The Backstagers, and many others.
- Morgan Perry has been promoted to Retail Sales Coordinator. Prior to joining the company in 2017, Perry had been an intern with the marketing team in 2014 and was the assistant manager at the award-winning Earth-2 Comics in Sherman Oaks.
- Averie Huffine joined the company as Vice President of Development- Television. Huffine joined BOOM! Studios’ Fox Lot office in June of 2018, where she currently oversees all TV efforts including the company’s first-look TV development deal at 20th Century TV Studio. Huffine was previously at Amy Pascal’s Pascal Pictures, where she helped build the company’s television presence and oversaw such projects as Drifter, written by Mattson Tomlin with Marc Webb directing, and Darktown written by Damani Johnson with Charles McDougall directing and Jamie Foxx producing. On the feature side she brought in the bestselling novel Beneath a Scarlett Sky by Mark Sullivan with Tom Holland attached to star.
- Esther Kim has joined as Marketing Coordinator. Kim joined BOOM! Studios in September, 2018 after two years at Image Comics in sales and administrative roles. Previously, Kim was the manager of Fantom Comics in Washington DC, earning national acclaim with outlets like NPR for her efforts in developing the local comic book community.
Brice joined Dark Horse in 2013. Previously the senior trade sales manager, he administers the day-to-day relationship between Dark Horse’s trade sales team and the company’s distributor, Penguin Random House Publisher Services. Among other duties, he is responsible for providing accurate schedules, metadata, and sales and marketing deliverables to PRHPS, and is a vital member of the sales team representing Dark Horse to the book trade. He will maintain these responsibilities in his new position while taking a lead role in many new initiatives aimed at maximizing sales and expandingDark Horse’s presence in the market.
“In the five years I’ve known Sean, I’ve been impressed by the growth of his knowledge and skills, and the critical thinking he applies to everything he does. He’s a problem-solver and has great out-of-the-box ideas, but also possesses good instincts about what is worth putting effort into, as well as a strong understanding of the importance of nailing the fundamentals,” said Mark Bernardi, Dark Horse vice president of book trade and digital sales.
As Sales Manager at Valiant HQ, Ward is focused on further developing relationships with Valiant’s direct market retail partners. Ward is also spearheading promotional campaigns for new issues and new story arcs for Valiant titles. Thanks to her years of experience in comic book retail and even more years as a passionate comic book fan, Ward’s the perfect choice to help Valiant continue to grow and meet retailers’ needs.
