Gen-Z, Millennial Momvertising Opps: Penguin Random House launches unburnable book after tapping new marketers (Score 27)

Penguin Random House teamed up with Canada-based agency Rethink to create an unburnable book as an effort to speak out against the rise in book burning in North American schools. Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale now has an unburnable version, complete with a black Cinefoil dust jacket, a phenolic hardcover and pages that have white heat shield foil. It's sewn together with nickel wire and has head and tail bands made of stainless steel, glued together with Kapton high-temp adhesive. We may see promotional activity around the launch, so sellers should contact soon to secure last-minute ad dollars.

Penguin's team has also grown; within the past couple of months, it hired marketing director Milena Brown (February) and growth marketing VP Anne Bono (May).

Per Pathmatics, the company has spent roughly $3.5m on digital ads YTD, up 21% from the roughly $2.9m it had spent by this point last year. In 2021, Penguin ended up spending roughly $7.6m on this channel, up 6% from the roughly $7.2m it spent in 2020. So far this year, the company has earned around 464.7m digital impressions via Instagram (36%), Facebook (34%), desktop display (24%), mobile display (4%), desktop video (2%) and Twitter (1%) ads. Top site destinations for this year's desktop display ads include yahoo.com (14%), nytimes.com, cafemom.com, nationalreview.com and thestir.cafemom.com.

Penguin typically targets Gen-Z and millennials with a skew toward moms. Kantar data reports the company also utilizes print, OOH, radio and local broadcast.

Agency & martech readers - The aforementioned hires may lead to agency reviews, so keep it on your radar for potential work. Penguin currently has an in-house media team and works with creative AOR Verso Advertising.