When Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen started shopping around their Chicken Soup book idea, they were rejected 134 times (“and here we are 100 million books later”), including rejections from twenty major publishers.
Now, total retail sales of Chicken Soup for the Soul branded merchandise reached over $1.3 billion, top media brands like King Features (stories in 77 newspapers—daily), Woman’s World (stories to 1.6 million subscribers—weekly), BeliefNet (stories to 770,000 subscribers—daily) and others have cross-promotion relationships with Chicken Soup for the Soul.
Quote from their agent, Jeff Herman:
No rejection is fatal until the writer walks away from the battle leaving dreams and goals behind.
Want to find out about other famous author rejections? Visit Writers & Rejections: Don’t Give Up!
Sources:
Chicken Soup For The Soul website
TheSop.org interview with Mark Victor Hansen
Coping With Rejection Letters from Suite101.com
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
That is amazing news! Perseverance wins the race! Good for the authors of “Chicken Soup for the Soul!” They never gave up and kept sending out that book over and over again until a publisher took it. The “perseverance quote above is onethat my mother & grandfather used in their book titled “Sod House to Shelterbelt!”
My fourth book just was published in time to help children stay healthy as the Swine Flu, colds and cough season begins. It is titled “Cough In Your Shirt, Bert!” by Sheralee Hill Iglehart.
San Francisco Chronicle has a book review on it by going to the link: http://www.sfgate.com/books click on the book cover “click here for more information” to see book review and to order the new book, “Cough..” Thanks for sharing!
Good Morning, Debbie Redpath Ohi ~Inkygirl.com,
You post great articles and wonderful, unique drawings. Thank you for sharing this link. I enjoy seeing what you write and draw! Hope to see you again, perhaps at the International SCBWI Conference 2010 in NYC. Keep up your fine work!