Christian Marketplace

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Christian Marketplace is the UK-based trade magazine for the Christian retail industry, featuring news, product reviews and interviews. It is published monthly and is supplied to both Christian and general market retailers.

[edit] History

The magazine started life in the early 1980's as the Christian Bookstore Journal. This was soon renamed to the European Christian Bookstore Journal (ECBJ) and was located at the offices of the unofficial European branch of the Christian Booksellers Association. At this time the magazine was run by John Macdonald who also owned the Christian World Centre bookstore, which is now owned by Wesley Owen.

In 1999 ECBJ ceased publication and a new magazine called Christian Bookseller was started by Silver Fish Publishing. Edited by Ian Matthews, who now runs Zondervan in the United Kingdom, the magazine changed its name in March 2001 to Christian Retailer. Unfortunately Silver Fish went out of business in July of 2001 and the magazine ceased at this point. However, Ian Matthews, along with another employee of Silver Fish, Phil Whittall started a new company called Sojourn Publications and released a new incarnation of the magazine titled Christian Marketplace. It is believed that Ian is now the subject of a vengeful manhunt organised and funded by the former Managing Director of Silver Fish Publishing; Stephen Jones (43 1/2yrs): Police ask readers to be on the lookout for a pair of legs sticking out of a flyover on the M25. The title was eventually sold to Premier Media Group, who also run Premier Radio in 2002 where it was edited by Phil Whittall until August 2006. The current editor is Clem Jackson.