“If Margaret Atwood could sell out a bookshop signing, why couldn’t she do events in 2,000-seat venues across the country?”
How are the Fane Group challenging the traditional model of book events? CEO Alex Fane discusses the company’s business strategy and success in reaching an untapped demographic of readers in this fascinating comment piece on The Bookseller.
To read the article in full, click here.
Fane Australia has appointed Karan White as Head of Partnerships, marking a pivotal moment in the company’s growth across the Australian and New Zealand markets.
Fane Australia, a division of the Fane Group, plays a key role in delivering the Group’s renowned programming, which has positioned the Fane Group as a global leader in producing and curating in-conversation events and solo tours featuring some of the most prominent names in culture and entertainment. With offices in London and Sydney, the Fane Group operates across Europe, the USA, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. Through transformative connections between artists and audiences, the Fane Group has solidified its reputation as the partner of choice for talent, publishers, and agents worldwide.
This strategic expansion offers corporate clients and brands in Australia and New Zealand the opportunity to engage with world-class talent—often unavailable locally—for speaker bookings and exclusive collaborations. Fane Australia’s past partnerships with major brands like Mercedes-Benz, Audi and PxC demonstrates its ability to create unique opportunities in this space.
White’s role will focus on overseeing partnerships, with a particular emphasis on speaker bookings and brand collaborations for touring artists. With more than a decade of experience across film, TV, publishing, radio, product launches, and events, White is ideally positioned to drive Fane Australia’s expanding business. Previously, she served as the inaugural Co-Vice Chair and Guiding Council Committee Member of the Australian Influencer Marketing Council (AiMCO), where she played a key role in developing the Australian Influencer Code of Conduct, shaping ethical standards for the industry.
Commenting on her appointment, White said, “Joining Fane Australia is an exciting opportunity to build on the company’s success and create new avenues for artists and brands to connect in meaningful ways. I’m eager to bring my experience to a team that’s known for pushing boundaries in entertainment and business partnerships.”
Peter Richardson, Director of Fane Australia, added, “Karan’s background in talent partnerships and her extensive industry network will be invaluable as we expand our artist tours for 2025 and beyond. Her expertise will help us provide clients with unique opportunities to engage with world-class talent not typically available in the Australian and New Zealand markets.”
White’s leadership will play a key role in strengthening relationships with local and global brands as Fane Australia continues to grow.
For more information and updates, visit the Fane website.
Fane Group launched – Leading production company enters a new chapter
● Fane Group launched to house Fane’s growing list of brands in the UK and internationally
● Core team expands to 32 following new hires within Fane’s B2B division
● 419,371 tickets sold in 2023, over 100,000 of which included a book www.fane-group.com
Alex Fane has today launched the Fane Group, an umbrella company to house Fane’s growing portfolio of brands in the UK and internationally. The Fane Group consolidates the business’s existing services for corporates and consumers (Fane UK, Fane Australia, Fane Inc, Fane Speakers, LoveMyRead and Kontour Productions).
Founded in 2017, Fane Productions has grown exponentially to become the global operation it is today, taking its renowned programming to consumers and corporates alike and becoming a partner of choice for talent, publishers and agents in the UK and internationally.
With 32 full-time staff within its core business, the company has offices in London and Sydney, and operates in the UK, EU, North America and Australasia.
The launch of Fane Group follows a fantastic year for Fane with 419,371 tickets and 100,000 books sold, with events featuring over 100 of the most exciting names in culture and entertainment from leading authors to actors to thought leaders. In a number of cases, Fane events helped secure Sunday Times bestseller listings for their authors, including Bob Odenkirk’s Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama (paperback) and Elizabeth Day’s Friendaholic (hardback). Other highlights from the 2023 live programme included: UK events with Tom Hanks, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Blindboy, Emma Dabiri, Elizabeth Day in conversation with Pheobe Waller-Bridge, and a Dark Matter partnership event with Candice Brathwaite, Ore Agjabe-Williams, Lizzie Damilola Blackburn and Jendella Benson. International events included Linda Evangelista in Canada, and Nigella Lawson and Yotam Ottolenghi in Australia. Fane Online also had an incredible line-up, including events with Alice Oseman, Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai, Rebecca Yarros and Sir Ben Okri, and debut writers Mikaela Loach, Fern Brady and Jacqueline Crooks.
This evolution is the latest in a series of developments for the business, the most recent being the launch of Fane Speakers in September 2023: a new platform connecting businesses with speaking talent. One of the latest services offered by Fane’s B2B division, it sits alongside Fane Connect, a full event service. New hires to the division in 2024 include Elliot Brough as Head of Partnerships, Danny Lee as Associate Director and Chloe Gill leading on Fane Connect.
Other internal changes include a promotion to the Leadership Team for Lucy Bond, who becomes a Director.
Alex Fane, CEO of the Fane Group, comments:
“It’s an exciting new chapter for Fane as we launch our group identity. The last few years have seen the company grow from strength-to-strength, evolving in real time with the changes in the events industry. I’m hugely grateful to my colleagues, an incredible, passionate and ambitious team from across the creative industries, for supporting me on the journey thus far, and excited to see how our new team members help us evolve further still. Despite the scale on which we now operate, Fane’s core principles are unchanged: we continue to take creative risks to remain innovative, collaborative and culturally relevant and to put relationships at the heart of everything we do.”
For more information, please contact Sofia Saghir at Riot Communications sofia@riotcommunications.com / 07888673706
Notes to editors
● The Fane Group specialises in producing and curating spoken word events with the most exciting names in culture and entertainment.
● Across its corporate and consumer divisions, it provides a platform through which talent can promote their work, both in the UK and internationally.
● Made up of passionate, ambitious team-players from across the creative industries, Fane believes a great idea can come from anywhere and anyone. It will go the extra mile and take creative risks to ensure it delivers events that are innovative, engaging and culturally relevant.
● Fane works with the best talent in the business. It provides a springboard for emerging talent – whom it nurtures over the long-term – as well as having earned the trust of the biggest names in culture and entertainment.
● Accessibility and equity are at the heart of the business: through both its commercial and non-profit work, Fane strives to be a driver of positive change within the industry.
● Fane’s B2B arm celebrates one year of business with new hire, Scarlet Mckeown
● First year of corporate events generates 20,000 book sales and £250,000 in author fees
● Fane for Business Director Jonathan Philips looking to expand Fane for Business contracts in the UK and internationally
Fane for Business, Fane’s B2B events production arm, today celebrates one year since launching. Spearheaded by Jonathan Phillips, the Fane for Business team specialises in spoken word events and helps drive book sales to non-consumer audiences. It offers corporations access to leading authors, event production and corporate memberships to Fane Live.
Over the past 12 months, Fane for Business has delivered author events for over 40 different businesses ranging from Ralph Lauren and Lego to Meta and Selfridges. Highlights include: book events with Stanley Tucci at Google and Meta; Mo Gawdat and Elizabeth Day at Snapchat; Maria Ressa at Goldman Sachs, and 12 bespoke author events – including Nicola Rollock, Travis Alabanza and Pragya Agarwal – for Baillie Gifford’s Beyond Words festival. Corporate events offer publishers an excellent opportunity to drive additional orders. Year one has seen Fane for Business sell over 20,000 books and generate over £250,000 in author fees.
The one-year anniversary coincides with a new hire in Scarlet Mckeown, previously Account Manager at Speakers Corner, who becomes Head of Speaker Bureau as of 10th July, a new role created for Fane for Business. Mckeown will lead on all Speaker Bureau business, continuing to build on the success of the proposition, its overall direction and its marketing plans, both in the UK and internationally. She will work closely with publishers to maximise corporate book buying opportunities for key authors. Meanwhile, Mckeown’s hire will free Phillips up to pursue wider event services contracts, both in the UK and internationally.
Scarlet Mckeown, Head of Speaker Bureau at Fane for Business, adds “I am thrilled to be joining Fane for Business as Head of their fast-growing Speaker Bureau. As a full-service event agency with years of experience and industry knowledge, as well as close ties to the publishing industry, Fane for Business brings a truly unique offering to the corporate speaking world and I am excited to see this grow and develop.”
Jonathan Phillips, Director, Fane for Business, comments “The appetite from the corporate world for curated access to author experts, household names and world class events remains strong. It has been fantastic to witness our rapid growth in this space over the last 12 months.
We’re delighted Scarlet will be joining the team in July to further bolster our proposition and expertise in this space.”
For more information about Fane for Business, please visit forbusiness.fane.co.uk.
For more information, please contact Tessa Deterding at Riot Communications tessa@riotcommunications.com / 07888 668 953
Notes to editors:
● About Fane for Business
Fane For Business is a B2B events production company specialising in spoken word events. They are experts in connecting organisations with the most exciting names in culture, business and entertainment. Fane for Business offers a wide range of services: the team provides organisations with an inspiring speaker, an experienced production team to manage and livestream events from their state-of-the-art studio, a new way to engage with an organisation’s in-house teams or client base, or an entirely bespoke corporate partnership or sponsorship package.
Through their Author Speaker Bureau, market-leading Event Services and innovative Corporate Memberships and Subscriptions, Fane for Business has established itself as the partner of choice for corporate partners across the globe.
● About Fane Productions
Fane is a leader in the production and curation of spoken word events, bringing the most exciting names in culture and entertainment to audiences around the world.
Founded to provide a platform where established and emerging talent can promote their work, the company is renowned for creating unique, dynamic events that tap into the conversations of the moment.
Established as the partner of choice for publishers, authors and podcasters in the UK and internationally, Fane continues to diversify. It has expanded its high-quality offer to include LoveMyRead: the UK’s best book subscription service, Fane for Business – connecting world-class authors and first-rate event services with global corporate clients – and a distribution hub for books and merchandise, complementing its existing hybrid events programme and Fane TV app.
Fane prides itself on delivering a line-up that offers something for everyone and can be accessed by anyone, anywhere. Highlights from its 2022 hybrid events programme have included over 70 dates at venues across the UK for astronaut Tim Peake, Candice Carty-Williams’s book launch at Peckham Plex, live recordings for Elizabeth Day’s hit podcast How To Fail, 20 tour dates with Graham Norton to celebrate his new novel, and an unmissable opportunity to spend an evening with Dame Judi Dench. Highlights from its online programme included Viola Davis, Nigel Slater, Malala Yousafzai, Matthew McConaughey, Brit Bennett & Okechukwu Nzelu, and Madeline Miller. Outside of the UK, Fane has offices in Sydney and operates in the USA, Europe, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.
Fane, a leader in the production and curation of spoken word events, todayannounces its expanded partnership with Jacaranda, an award-winning, diverse-owned independent publisher and bookseller.
Jacaranda is dedicated to promoting and celebrating brilliant diverse literature and ideas. Since 2014, Jacaranda has published over 70 books, including the works of multiple award-winners Irenosen Okojie, Fiston Mwanza Mujila, Bernice L. McFadden, and Shola von Reinhold. In 2020, it achieved a publishing industry first when – through its TwentyIn2020 campaign – it became the first UK publisher to release 20 titles by 20 Black British writers in one year. To pay homage to the campaign, Fane produced an online festival in December 2020 featuring seven events, with a portion of the profits donated to the Black Cultural Archives (BCA).
Over the course of 2023, will amplify key Jacaranda titles through a mixture of events – both consumer andcorporate – and direct-to-consumer offerings. This will include three in-person and four online eventsand theinclusion of Jacaranda titles in Fane’s book subscription package, LoveMyRead, with themed boxes provided to mark Windrush Day in June and Black History Month in October. Further marketing support for events will be supplied byanother Fane partner, Dark Matter, a specialist marketing agency dedicated to creating campaigns that are fully immersed in the Black British experience today. Updates on Jacaranda authors and publications will also be featured monthly in Fane’s newsletter, which goes out to a subscription base of over 120,000. Full details of the events can be found below.
This partnership is the latest in a series of creative collaborations introduced by Fane to improve representation of and engagement with underrepresented groups in its programming and book subscription services. As well as working with Jacaranda and Dark Matter, Fane has an established partnership with Dialogue Books, a publisher that shines a spotlight on stories for, about and by readers from the LGBTQI+, disability, working class and BAME communities.It has also used its book subscription service LoveMyRead to establish partnerships with Rebel Girls and Knights Of, who each curated a children’s list for LoveMyRead’s autumn 2022 programme.
Serena Brett, Producer at Fane, said:
“We are delighted to be officially partnering with Jacaranda this year, in the year of their 10th anniversary. We have long admired their work and feel that our ethos and aims are perfectly matched, especially in our attitudes to challenging the status quo. The partnership spans the breadth of Fane’s offering, comprising of live and hybrid events, online shows, Fane for Business, LoveMyRead, production services, and marketing support. This partnership will support Jacaranda’s publications in unique and creative ways calling on all areas of Fane’s business and help to amplify the voices, stories, and experiences of all marginalised groups.”
Jazzmine Breary, COO at Jacaranda, added:
“Following our first collaboration on our TwentyIn2020 campaign, we are thrilled to be working withFaneagain on some of our key titles for 2023. This new aspect of our relationship will see us expand our relationship to wider areas of the Fane offeringhelping our books to reach a wider, and increasingly diverse audience.”
Further details on Fane’s work with venues, publishers, community groups, charities and outreach organisations, can be found here, in its Accountability Charter, which sets out the company’s commitments around ED&I. Launched in 2021, the Charter outlines Fane’s commitments across three key pillars of the business: Audience Development, Creative Partnerships, and Internal Practices and is updated regularly.
For more information, please contact Hedvig Lindstrom at Riot Communications
hedvig@riotcommunications.com / 07888 671 581
Notes to editors:
In-person events
Online events
LoveMyRead subscription boxes
Fane is a leader in the production and curation of spoken word events, bringing the most exciting names in culture and entertainment to audiences around the world. Founded to provide a platform where established and emerging talent can promote their work, the company is renowned for creating unique, dynamic events that tap into the conversations of the moment.
Established as the partner of choice for publishers, authors and podcasters in the UK and internationally, Fane continues to diversify. It has expanded its high-quality offer to include LoveMyRead: the UK’s best book subscription service, Fane for Business – connecting world-class authors and first-rate event services with global corporate clients – and a distribution hub for books and merchandise, complementing its existing hybrid events programme and Fane TV app.
Fane prides itself on delivering a line-up that offers something for everyone and can be accessed by anyone, anywhere. Highlights from its 2022 hybrid events programme have included over 70 dates at venues across the UK for astronaut Tim Peake, Candice Carty-Williams’s book launch at Peckham Plex, live recordings for Elizabeth Day’s hit podcast How To Fail, 20 tour dates for Graham Norton to celebrate his new novel, and a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to spend an evening with Dame Judi Dench.
Highlights from its online programme included Viola Davis, Nigel Slater, Malala Yousafzai, Brit Bennett & Okechukwu Nzelu, and Madeline Miller. Outside of the UK, Fane has offices in Sydney and operates in the USA, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. The current Fane line-up can be found here.
Twitter: @faneproductions
Instagram: @faneproductions
Jacaranda Books is an award-winning independent publisher. We are dedicated to
promoting and celebrating brilliant diverse literature. Since launching our first title in 2014,we have published 80+ titles by a raft of talented authors, including Anni Domingo, CherieDimaline, Stanley J Browne and Shola von Reinhold.
In 2019 Jacaranda won the LBF International Excellence Award for Inclusivity in Publishing,and was named Small Press of the Year at the British Book Awards the following year. In thatlandmark year, we launched #TwentyIn2020: an unprecedented initiative to publish 20 titlesby 20 Black British writers in a single year. That same year, we also co-launched the#InclusiveIndies campaign as a response to the impact of Covid-19 on publishers likeourselves — raising over £100,000 that we were able to share with 12 other independentsmall presses.
In 2021, Jacaranda formed a historic partnership with Hachette UK, expanding our sales anddistribution to support the flourishing global market for readers of books by diverse voices.
Our ethos is simple — we are committed to publishing ground-breaking writing withadedication to creating space on the bookshelf for diverse ideas and writers.
Twitter: @JacarandaBooks
Instagram: @jacarandabooks