Pam Anderson Brings the “Plus” to Publishing

By Kathryn 

“Those who thought a TV show positing Pamela Anderson as a bookseller was a laughable idea have turned out to be right,” the Book Standard reports; the FOX sitcom (previously mentioned here and here) is turning out to be “an unexpected hit” for the Rupert Murdoch-owned network.

For HarperCollins, which plugs its books on the sitcom each week— the publisher outfits the show’s bookstore set with a rotating library of its titles—a second season of Stacked could yield an even more fruitful partnership: HarperCollins authors may appear for bookstore signings, with the possibility of having their books worked into the show’s storylines.

Paul Lance, HarperCollins’ director of West Coast operations, who helped orchestrate the arrangement between the publisher and the production company, readily acknowledges that he doesn’t know how big an impact, if any, Stacked is having on book sales. But he knows the agreement isn’t hurting the house’s much-touted branding efforts.

Those (much-touted?) branding efforts, if you don’t already know, come with the unimaginatively grandiose name “Publishing +” — a name whose last half suggests that Pam may turn out to be a natural (so to speak) choice of mascot.