Project archive: Importer
Our most recent projects are shown first
Siop y Pethe
Siop y Pethe has been part of Wales’ literary community since 1967, and they continue to support and promote Welsh literature through our new website – which is fully bi-lingual in Welsh and English.
Crécy Publishing
Since 1997, Crécy has been a leader of transport and military history publishing across Europe. With a rich back catalogue and a constant list of new and upcoming titles, they offer one of the strongest and most varied selections of aviation, railway and military history titles on the market.
Viper Books
Viper was established in 2019 as the specialist crime and thriller imprint of Profile Books. Its mission is to publish Books with Bite: the best and brightest in the genre, celebrating new voices and unique approaches to murder and mystery.
After starting life as part of the Serpent’s Tail website, we created a new sister site for the Profile and Serpent’s Tail sites, using the same architecture.
Heartwood Publishing
Website for travel specialists Heartwood, founded early in 2020 to publish and distribute a strong portfolio of complementary travel brands in the UK and across markets worldwide, and winners of the Specialist Publisher of the Year award at the 2024 Independent Publishing Awards.
“Heartwood Publishing worked closely with Bookswarm throughout 2024, having appointed them to build a new website that addressed a number of challenges:
- To create a single web presence for our portfolio of brands
- Through the new site’s creation, replace two old and out of date sites
- Support visits from consumers, retail customers and potential B2B business partners
- Provide a platform that would automatically update product content using Onix feeds
- Structure the design around distinct brands serving different purposes, whilst maintaining clear navigation for users
- Future proofing on a number of fronts, including the facility for direct sales, user accounts, adding brands, generating themed content and linking to social media
- Ease of updating and platform management for non-technical team members
Bookswarm delivered all of the above in a timely and cost-effective way, whilst maintaining their patience with us as the brief evolved during the design and build. Their publishing industry expertise was especially helpful, when it came to understanding specific issues we needed to tackle and the practical delivery of live Onix data feeds.
We would definitely recommend using Bookswarm to other publishers seeking to develop their web presence. “
Andy Riddle, Founder – Heartwood Publishing
UCL Press
Established as the UK’s first fully open access university press in 2015, UCL Press has fast become one of the leading open access scholarly publishers in the UK. They publish a wide range of open access scholarly monographs and edited collections, student textbooks and academic journals that are available to read and download free of charge.
We created a new ONIX-powered website to replace the previous Shopify-based site, providing greater flexibility over management of content and a much more tailored way of displaying book information, with a single page for each book that contains information and purchasing options for all editions.
“Simon and his team are fantastic to work with – adaptable, responsive and they really understand the requirements of a small publisher. They immediately understood our unique challenges and came up with cost-effective solutions to meet our needs, WHILST ALSO BEING A JOY TO WORK WITH. Highly recommend!”
Alison Fox, Marketing and Distribution Manager, UCL Press
Leuven University Press
Leuven University Press is a mission-driven academic press of international repute. We created a new ONIX-powered website to replace the previous Shopify-based site, providing greater flexibility over management of content and a much more tailored way of displaying book information, with a single page for each book that contains information and purchasing options for all editions.
“It has been a pleasure to work with Simon and the Bookswarm team for the second time to renew our website. Simon and Alex are very experienced in book metadata, ONIX, and WordPress, and they always strive to find the best solutions for our wishes and needs within budget. The ONIX-powered website they developed is an indispensable tool for us to efficiently and flexibly present our books online.”
Annemie Vandezande, Leuven University Press
The History Press
The History Press is an independent non-fiction publisher based in the heart of Cheltenham, Gloucestershire – also home to one of the most prestigious literary festivals in the country.
We created a new website populated using an ONIX feed from their Consonance title management system, with the option to sell selected titles directly (special editions, signed copies, etc.). All ebooks are available to buy via Glassboxx.
“Having worked with Simon in the past, Bookswarm instantly sprang to mind when I needed to deliver a new company website in time for the 2024 London Book Fair. Simon and his team easily outclassed the competition with their thoughtful proposal, which showed the most care and attention to our brief.
With a very tight window for delivery, the Bookswarm team remained responsive throughout while providing excellent customer care. Each of our challenges was met with creative problem-solving and industry-specific advice allowing us play to our strengths. The entire project was also clearly costed and came in well under budget with no nasty surprises. The end result was a beautifully designed, functional website that we are all proud of (live as of March 8, 2024).
It’s worth noting that support since launch has remained exemplary with swift responses as issues arise. On one occasion we had mere days to launch a complex, time-limited offer. Simon was still on hand to help, despite being on holiday and separated by a 12-hour time zone. The successful campaign brought us thousands in revenue.
If you’re dithering over whether to include Bookswarm for tender, I’d urge you stop reading this and get on with contacting them for a chat and a quote!”
Cynthia Hamilton, Head of PR & Marketing at The History Press
Hachette Schools
Hachette Schools brings pupils, teachers and librarians closer to brilliant Hachette Children’s Group books and authors.
Their extensive list of titles ranges from fantastic non-fiction that supports the curriculum, to well-loved authors including Cressida Cowell, Kes Gray, David Almond, Patrice Lawrence, Dermot O’Leary, Francesca Simon, Matthew Syed.
The site allows visitors to discover a wealth of free resources for new and well-loved books, specially written to support the curriculum and encourage discussion in the classroom or library, and hear about all the latest news and competitions.
University of London Press
The University of London Press are passionate advocates for the humanities – a collaborative, non-profit and predominantly open access publishing partner to researchers and institutions. Users of their new website can buy books, browse series, learn more about their team and their publishing model, or submit a proposal.
“It has been an absolute pleasure working with Simon and Bookswarm on our new website for the University of London Press. As a small university press team publishing both open access and non-open access books, Simon worked closely and patiently with us to make the experience easy, enjoyable and on budget. We’re delighted with our new website which really enhances the visibility and discoverability of our books and have already recommended Bookswarm to other publishers!”
Paula Kennedy, Head Of Publishing at University of London Press
Bedford Square Publishers
Bedford Square Publishers is an independent publisher of fiction and non-fiction, founded in 2022 in the historic streets of Bedford Square London and the sea mist shrouded green of Bedford Square Brighton.
The site uses an ONIX feed from Consonance to populate its catalogue, and also incorporates a ‘sub site’ for the No Exit Press imprint – No Exit titles and authors have separate branding.
“It was so fantastic to work with the Bookswarm team as they were both collaborative and creative but also transparent about everything they were doing, including the costs. So we got a website that we are really pleased with and it all came in on time and within budget.”
Laura Fletcher, co-founder & Commercial Director at Bedford Square Publishers
Duckworth – 125th Anniversary Edition
A major update to the Duckworth website to celebrate the publisher’s 125th birthday!
“Hugely knowledgeable, practically minded and super-responsive – what more could you want? Simon and all the team at Bookswarm are a genuine pleasure to work with.”
Pete Duncan, MD, Duckworth Books Group
Reaktion Books
An independent publisher of adventurous and innovative non-fiction since 1985, Reaktion Books publishes around 90 new titles each year, and has nearly 1,000 titles in print. Their list ranges widely across art and visual culture, biography, food history, general history, music, natural history, philosophy, politics and popular science.
The new Reaktion site offers e-commerce, including an innovative monthly Book Club where members receive a free ebook of their choice each month, as well as a 40% discount on all other purchases.
“It’s been a pleasure working with Simon and Bookswarm on the development of our new website. From initial design meeting, through development and final rollout, Simon and his team have been unfailingly responsive, diligent and professional. We are very pleased with our new site and have noticed an increase in sales and traffic immediately. I have no hesitation in recommending Bookswarm to any potential customer.”
David Hoek, Sales Manager, Reaktion Books
Tiger Tales
Tiger Tales publishes imaginative picture, board, novelty, chapter, and nonfiction books for children of all ages. Whether the story is funny, whimsical, informative, or teaches a gentle lesson, Tiger Tales books are designed to entertain, educate, and engage young readers.
Scion Publishing
Scion Publishing Ltd was established in 2003 to publish high quality and innovative medical and life science books for students. It is still run day-to-day by its founders. Their new e-commerce website was created alongside that for their sister company, Lantern Publishing.
Lantern Publishing
Lantern was formed in June 2011 with the aim of publishing innovative and readable books for nursing, health and social care. Their new e-commerce website was created alongside that for their sister company, Scion Publishing.
Profile Editions
Profile Editions, the custom publishing business of Profile Books, which focuses on publishing custom arts, heritage and company histories, wanted to transition away from a Magento-based e-commerce store to a WordPress-based site. We recreated the site using WooCommerce, with title data imported from an ONIX feed – and incorporated a raft of subtle design changes during the project as well.
Rock the Boat
Rock the Boat was launched in 2015 with the goal of publishing bold, diverse and thought-provoking books for children and Young Adults. We created an imprint site for Rock the Boat at the same time as we were redesigning the website of parent publisher Oneworld.
Oneworld
Oneworld was founded in 1986 by husband and wife team Juliet Mabey and Novin Doostdar as an independent publishing house focusing on stimulating non-fiction. Now publishing over 100 books a year, Oneworld has retained its founding commitment to the old-fashioned principles of great writing, editorial excellence, high production values, and marketing flair, to produce books that are read by the intellectually curious all over the world.
We have created a new, modern web presence which is automatically updated via an ONIX feed from Stison.
b small publishing
b small are on a mission to empower all readers with critical literacy skills. Whether that’s examining engineering through fun activities or digging for the truth behind real-life mysteries – or even learning to speak French or Spanish – the books they publish help children make sense of themselves, others, and the world around them.
“From the very start of our working relationship together, Simon and the team have been efficient, understanding and incredibly patient with all our little tweaks and queries – no question or adjustment was too tedious, finickity or small! Such a joy to have a bespoke website that so perfectly meets our needs, and a real weight off our shoulders to know that the Bookswarm team are on hand to handle any issues that crop up. Simon has been a real pleasure to work with and we’re thrilled with the final result.”
Naomi Weeks, Marketing and Publicity Manager, b small publishing
Batsford Books
A website for newly-independent Batsford, which has been part of other publishing companies for more than 20 years, derived from the website of Pavilion, from which Batsford is being ‘spun out’.
SmartLab Toys
Since 2004, SmartLab Toys’ STEAM products have earned more than 50 of the toy industry’s most prestigious awards, including multiple Oppenheim Platinum awards and the Good Housekeeping Best Toy awards. Now part of the Quarto Group, their passion is creating toys and games that inspire creative thinking while providing opportunities for children and adults to learn and play together.
Swift Press
Swift Press is an independent publishing company that launched in June 2020. Part of the Independent Alliance, they publish fiction and a wide range of non-fiction.
“We worked with Bookswarm to create the website for our new publishing company Swift Press and were delighted with the results. Simon is great to work with, the communication was always clear, punctual and thorough and we felt very supported throughout the build process and beyond. Highly recommend the Bookswarm team!”
Swift Press
Walter Foster
Brimming with tips, techniques, and step-by-step lessons, as well as practical exercises, unique projects, and creative prompts, Walter Foster’s engaging and inspiring books have helped people around the world discover their creative talents, learn new mediums, and achieve their artistic goals. This new website showcases their books as well as providing a wealth of additional inspiration and resources through the Art Studio.
Chelsea Green UK
Founded in 1984, Chelsea Green Publishing is a 100% employee-owned leading publisher of books on the politics and practice of sustainable living. The UK arm, Chelsea Green Publishing UK Ltd, was created in 2018, with an aim of developing a new publishing programme in the UK, as well as partnering with like-minded, progressive organisations in the area of sustainable living. Chelsea Green now has the ability to sell directly to UK consumers via this WordPress and WooCommerce website, with bibliographic data feeding in from the US website, and orders sent automatically to Grantham Book Services.
“Bookswarm are an excellent agency resource for the book industry. They have a deep knowledge of the trade but crucially they also bring new learnings and tech ideas from other sectors to publisher projects, which allows the scoping to be collaborative and progressive.
They are extremely accurate with their costings and timings and this makes the work easy to budget, and the account management is as good as I’ve experienced at any agency of any size. I wouldn’t hesitate in recommending Bookswarm to anyone.”
Matt Haslum, Managing Director, Chelsea Green Publishing UK
Lion Hudson
Lion Hudson publish books and other media for children and adults to help them grow in their Christian faith. We created a new e-commerce website for Lion Husdson to replace the previous incarnation, focusing on ease of use and integration with multiple distributors and internal systems.
Profile Books
Twenty-five years sinces its founding and the mission of Profile Books is unchanged: to be a fearless publisher of a diverse range of distinctive books, of the highest quality, written by the best authors in their field, and to remain a beacon of independent publishing. We created a new website for Profile Books, powered by a feed from Biblio, to mark this milestone and to provide a solid foundation for all their future digital marketing.
A new website for imprint Serpent’s Tail was created as part of the same project.
“We had a great experience working with Bookswarm. Simon knows how publishing works and his vast experience meant that most challenges with our build had been encountered before and he was able to present flexible solutions. Responsive and agile as a team, we were pleasantly surprised by how stress free the builds were (we’ve built two sites with Bookswarm in the past year) and very pleased at how they’ve turned out.”
Niamh Murray, Campaigns Director, Profile Books
Serpent’s Tail
Serpent’s Tail is an imprint of Profile Books. They are passionate about finding and championing books that excite them creatively, by talented writers who don’t just break but smash the mould with work that opens up space for readers to think, and live, differently.
We designed their new website in tandem with the new website for Profile Books.
“We had a great experience working with Bookswarm. Simon knows how publishing works and his vast experience meant that most challenges with our build had been encountered before and he was able to present flexible solutions. Responsive and agile as a team, we were pleasantly surprised by how stress free the builds were (we’ve built two sites with Bookswarm in the past year) and very pleased at how they’ve turned out.”
Niamh Murray, Campaigns Director, Profile Books
Little Tiger
The Little Tiger Group was founded in 1987, and today they publish a huge range of formats and genres, striving to create a diverse range of high-quality books, with something that will appeal to every reading taste, helping children develop a passion for books and a life-long love of reading.
We designed and built a new e-commerce website for Little Tiger, using WordPress and WooCommerce. Product data is kept up to date automatically by Booksonix via the WooCommerce API.
The Classic Books Company
Retail site where readers can choose from thousands of classic books in the English language, with free UK delivery.
Little People, Big Dreams
Bookswarm has created a new digital home for Little People, BIG DREAMS, the best-selling biography series by Maria Isabel Sánchez Vegara.
Users can discover the lives of outstanding people, from designers and artists to scientists and activists. All of them achieved incredible things, yet each began life as a child with a dream. Told as a story, with a facts and photos section at the back, this sweet series for kids celebrates triumph over adversity through some of history’s favorite characters.
Quiller Publishing
Quiller Publishing Ltd is an independent publisher which was founded in 2001 by Andrew Johnston. Quiller Publishing has two imprints: Quiller is their general list and Kenilworth Press for equestrian titles. Over the years, Quiller Publishing has been built into an extremely well-respected publishing company, focusing originally on country sporting subjects and in recent years, diversifying into lifestyle titles along with a number of noted and highly regarded biographies and autobiographies.
This new website for Quiller features ‘live’ updates from their title management system, BooksoniX.
“It has been a great pleasure to work with Simon to develop the new Quiller Publishing website. He has been highly knowledgeable and supportive throughout the process. No question was too daft and no request was ever too hard, complex or unachievable. Simon works through problems methodically, providing easy and effective solutions. We are delighted with our finished product and think it’s fair to say Simon and his team absolutely nailed it!”
Becky Bowyer, Production Manager, Quiller Publishing
Practical Inspiration Publishing
Practical Inspiration Publishing is the home of books that mean business. From management to marketing, parenting to leadership, HR to health, internationally recognized authorities share their expertise in brilliantly readable books with accompanying online resources.
We created a new WooCommerce-based site so PIP could easily sell their titles online – with title and author data automatically imported from an ONIX feed.
“Working with Bookswarm has been a great experience. They totally get what authors and publishers need, for example they work intelligently with bibliographic data imports and warehouse orders. They’re proactive, responsive and incredibly fast – I can’t recommend them highly enough!”
Alison Jones, Director, Practical Inspiration Publishing
Bonnier Rights
Bonnier Rights sells foreign rights to fiction, illustrated and narrative non-fiction, and children’s books from the Swedish Bonnier Publishing Group, Sweden’s largest publisher.
We designed and built their new website using WordPress, and set it up so that books and authors are automatically added and updated, using a feed from Bonnier’s Opus rights management system.
Duckworth
Duckworth nurtures a rounded world view through accessible and stimulating works of popular science, psychology, memoir and history. Founded by the family of Virginia Woolf in 1898, Duckworth have published incredible authors including D.H. Lawrence, Oliver Sacks, Evelyn Waugh and Beryl Bainbridge.
We really enjoyed creating this site for Duckworth after they joined the Prelude Books family – and reading about their interesting and at times hair-raising history!
“Hugely knowledgeable, practically minded and super-responsive – what more could you want? Simon and all the team at Bookswarm are a genuine pleasure to work with.”
Pete Duncan, MD, Duckworth Books Group
Farrago Books
Website for Farrago Books, the series-driven humour imprint of Duckworth Books Group.
“Hugely knowledgeable, practically minded and super-responsive – what more could you want? Simon and all the team at Bookswarm are a genuine pleasure to work with.”
Pete Duncan, MD, Duckworth Books Group
Introducing
Migration of the site for Icon Books’ well known series of graphic guides to a WordPress back-end, while retaining the existing look and feel.
Updated in 2017 to celebrate Icon’s 25th birthday and tie-in with the look and feel of their main website.
Michael O’Mara Books
Creation of a new website for specialists in creative and inspired adult non-fiction, Michael O’Mara Books, encompassing their LOM ART and Buster Books imprints too. The website take a feed from the client’s Biblio system to keep the catalogue up to date.
Pavilion Books Group
Pavilion Books is a thriving independent London-based publisher specialising in illustrated books for the UK and all international markets. Their new website is populated with bibliographic data feeds from their Stison title management system, and also features a blog, news & events section and many different ways of exploring their books – by category, by imprint and by author.
Icon Books
ONIX-feed powered website for Icon Books, an independent UK publisher which produces popular, engaging and sometimes provocative non-fiction for adults.
In 2017, we launched a new version of the site to celebrate Icon’s 25th birthday!
Atlantic Books
Atlantic Books is an independent British publishing house founded in 2000. Based in the heart of Bloomsbury, they publish quality literary fiction and non fiction. Atlantic are also the home of commercial imprint Corvus, and proud publishers of a selection of books from Grove Atlantic in the US as well as a home to a growing list of fine fiction and non-fiction from Allen & Unwin.
We designed and built Atlantic’s new site to be updated with a feed from their Biblio system, and put their four imprints at the heart of the structure – so each imprint has its own ‘home page’ within the site.
Summersdale
Founded in 1990, Summersdale is a vibrant publisher that puts its heart and soul into creating exceptional books. They swiftly respond to emerging technology and trends, provide entertaining, informative and innovative content in the genres of travel writing, general non-fiction, health and well-being, and gift and humour. Summersdale produce a diverse range of over 150 titles per year, with a backlist of over 600 titles.
“I’m so proud and delighted with the new Summersdale website. It’s been a long time coming, but has been well worth the wait. I genuinely believe that we have one of the best websites out there. It looks stylish and modern, but it is also very functional. One of the site’s primary functions is to showcase our beautiful books, and they sure look good. Choosing Bookswarm to create our new site was the right choice, they have been magnificent.”
Alastair Williams, Managing Director, Summersdale
H for History
H for History is the historical fiction and non-fiction community from Hodder & Stoughton, Headline and Quercus. Bookswarm designed and built this responsive website to allow both books and blog posts to be explored using a range of classifications, including Period and Genre.
“When a project comes along I can work with Bookswarm on I immediately feel more relaxed. Communication on projects from start to finish is outstanding (and so important) which helps to move things along at a good pace and get the results we all want. Simon is always on hand for questions and advice throughout the project, and is incredibly tolerant of the unrelenting change requests and tweaks from our many stakeholders.”
Amy Dolman, Digital Marketing Manager, Hodder & Stoughton
Kelpies
Kelpies are Scottish books for children everywhere. The Kelpies imprint is published by independent publishing company Floris Books, which is based in Edinburgh, Scotland. We created this responsive, e-commerce site for them using WordPress and WooCommerce, integrating with their distributor, Booksource, to seamlessly send out orders.
Books from Scotland
BooksfromScotland showcases the best books of Scottish interest around, including the latest children’s, fiction and selected non-fiction titles, as well as titles from publishers based in Scotland.
Bookswarm developed a new Books from Scotland brand identity and a new website to showcase the Scottish titles, as well as developing a technical strategy to help easily identify which titles should include, based on processing of bibliographic data from Nielsen.
Tinder Press
Blog and catalogue website for Headline’s fiction imprint Tinder Press, a place where classy, intelligent writing thrives.
bookbridgr
bookbridgr lets book bloggers request books, exclusive content and author interviews direct from the publisher. It gives bloggers first access to dozens of front and backlist Headline titles (both in physical and ebook formats), while also allowing them to request a huge amount of extra book content for their blogs, join an author blog tour or request interviews with new and bestselling authors.
“Building bookbridgr with Simon and his team was awesome. From initial wire-framing right through to implementation and launch, he was on hand at every moment to build, fix, tweak – and most importantly to put my mind at ease throughout the process.”
Ben Willis, Publicity & Digital Campaigns Manager, Headline Publishing Group
