Zola Books

Zola Books is a New York based social eBook retailer that combines a social network, bookseller and recommendation engine. Founded by literary agents[1] and launched in September 2012.[2] the company was described by The Washington Post as "a venture whose strategy is to combine all three of the e-book world’s major market functions — retailing, curation and social-networking — in an ambitious bid to become a one-stop destination for book lovers on the Web".[3]

Zola Books Inc.
TypePrivate
Industry
FoundedSeptember 20, 2012 (2012-09-20)
Founder
  • Joe Regal
  • Michael Strong
Headquarters
New York
,
U.S.
Key people
Matt Goldfarb (CTO)
Websitezolabooks.com

History

Zola Books was founded 2012 by Joe Regal.[4] Several authors invested in Zola, including Audrey Niffenegger,[5] Gregory David Roberts and Chandler Burr.[6]

Zola Books acquired Bookish.com in January 2014, desiring Bookish.com's algorithmic software, which gave users book recommendations and suggestions.[1][7] Zola launched "The Everywhere Store," its own e-commerce widget, in October 2015.[8] In 2016, Zola completed a follow-up round of financing, earning $8.5 million.

Corporate affairs

Leadership

Zola Books is led by Co-Founders Joe Regal and Michael Strong. Other key executives are:[9]

  • Matt Goldfarb, Chief Technology Officer
  • Anita Perala, Director Product Development
  • Maryann Regal, Director Customer Service

Products

The site currently sells six eBook exclusives: The Accidental Victim by James Reston Jr., Isaac Marion's The New Hunger, Making Mavericks by surfer Frosty Hesson, The Chemickal Marriage by Gordon Dahlquist, Autumn Leaves by comic Annabelle Gurwitch and The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. The company will soon start selling eBooks from a variety of different publishers.[10] The social aspects of the website come from the ability to follow authors, publishers and other readers,[11] read book lists created by them, and see what friends are reading and where they highlight or mark passages in a book.[12] The site also features publishing news, exclusive author Q&As, and a large amount of book reviews. Zola is supportive of independent bookstores and provides them with storefronts on the site and a way for customers to pledge their allegiance to a certain store so that store receives money from all of that customer's purchases on the site.

Miscellaneous

The name Zola comes from the idea of including everything from Z to A on the website and being like Amazon but backwards.[13]

References
  1. Kaufman, Leslie (2014-01-06). "Online Retailer Zola Books Buys Bookish". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2019-07-04.
  2. Habash, Gabe (September 20, 2012). "Zola Books Begins Rollout of its E-tailing Site". Publishers Weekly.
  3. Nance, Kevin (October 3, 2012). "ZolaBooks plans to be one-stop shop for e-reading". The Washington Post.
  4. "Stock Market News and Information". www.marketscreener.com. Retrieved 2021-03-09.
  5. "New Social eBooks Retailer Zola Books Launches Private Beta, Raises $1M From Prominent Authors". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2021-03-09.
  6. "Zola Books Snares $5.1M in Seed Funding". vcnewsdaily.com. Retrieved 2021-03-18.
  7. Pilkington, Mercy (2014-01-07). "It Pays to Be Small: Zola Buys Book Discovery Site Bookish". Good e-Reader. Retrieved 2019-07-04.
  8. McGeough, Joan (2016-05-02). "DAK Capital Announces Funding for Zola Books". The DAK Group. Retrieved 2021-03-03.
  9. "Zola Books | Who We Are". zolabooks.com. Retrieved 2019-07-24.
  10. "Welcome to Zola Books! - Zola Books | Zola". Archived from the original on February 8, 2013. Retrieved February 8, 2013.
  11. "Zola E-book Store Puts Publishers Up Front - Publishing Perspectives". Publishing Perspectives. 2012-10-12. Retrieved 2018-09-02.
  12. Lardinois, Frederic (June 5, 2012). "New Social eBooks Retailer Zola Books Launches Private Beta, Raises $1M From Prominent Authors". Tech Crunch.
  13. "Zola Aims to Replace Google Books, Then Take on Amazon | Digital Book World". www.digitalbookworld.com. Archived from the original on 2012-07-21.
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