JDub, Nextbook launch partnership

JDub and Nextbook—two Jewish media start-ups with a knack for generating buzz (not to mention quality content)—have forged a strategic partnership.

Nextbook publishes a line of high-end Jewish books and the online magazine Tablet, which boasts several well-known columnists and recently attracted national media attention with its coverage of a Mormon senator’s Chanukah
recording.

JDub, a nonprofit record label that has hastened a new era of Jewish music, is best known for launching the career of Chasidic reggae sensation Matisyahu.

Under the partnership, the two organizations will remain separate and still produce their own records, books and cultural materials, but JDub essentially will become Nextbook’s inhouse marketing and public relations department.

When Nextbook publishes a book, JDub will put together an event to sell it and spur interest. JDub also will try to push Tablet stories in the broader media and position Tablet writers and editors as personalities with television and radio appearances, according to Tablet editor Alana Newhouse and JDub CEO Aaron Bisman.

The new partnership comes at a time when many nonprofits are struggling to chart a new course in the face of tough economic conditions.

Even before establishing the partnership, however, Nextbook had revamped its online presence and reduced its budget by 30 percent, and JDub had acquired the online magazine Jewcy.

In addition to producing tangible benefits for both entities, the new deal and the process that produced it also could potentially serve as a model for other organizations exploring ways of working together.

How did the full-scale partnership come together?

The two organizations built familiarity and trust by working together on smaller projects over the past year, so both sides said they decided it was a good match.

In looking at their missions—JDub’s is to advance Jewish culture and build Jewish community through music, and Nextbook’s is to advance Jewish culture and build Jewish community through literary endeavors—they saw a natural fit.

Two examples of how the new arrangement could work:

In August, Nextbook published a book about the Jewish boxer Barney Ross and hired JDub on a freelance basis to plan a book release party. JDub put together a shindig at the historic Gleason’s gym in Brooklyn that featured boxing matches, free beer and wine, guest appearances by Jewish boxer Dmitriy Salita and a performance of one of JDub’s bands, Soulico.

The event drew 400 people—most of them unfamiliar to the JDub and Nextbook staffs—and sold a bunch of books.

And last month, when U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), a Mormon, penned a Chanukah song for Tablet that was recorded by Rasheeda Azar, JDub helped push the video to the mainstream media, including The New York Times, which ultimately published a major story.

Newhouse says the ultimate goal is to use programming and the marketing of individual writers to create a stronger relationship between Tablet and its readers.

What’s in it for JDub?

In addition to paying a fee for the record label’s publicity services, Nextbook is providing JDub with office space in its Puck Building in the Soho neighborhood of New York. JDub moved in last month.

According to Bisman, it marks the first time that JDub employees have had doors to their offices. More important, he said, the partnership will allow JDub to continue to expand and grow its other products.