Company Spotlight
The Bright idea: an agency founder on plans to reinvent her business
The Bright Agency’s Vicki Willden-Lebrecht is putting creativity back on the menu. The author-illustrator specialist’s CEO talks about refocusing on the basics. Melina Spanoudi reports
W
hen Arabel la Stein announced that she was stepping down as managing director of The Bright Agency’s literary division
in the summer of 2023, the company was thrust into a period of uncertainty. Stein had joined Bright as an agent in 2016 and subsequently set up Bright Literary in 2022. CEO Vicki Willden-Lebrecht, who founded Bright in 2003, tells me: “So much of Bright was linked to Arabella, who had such publishing prowess.” The announcement of Stein’s departure was something of a surprise to the trade and it was unclear where the agency would go next. Back to what it does best was the answer,
as Willden-Lebrecht returned from maternity leave to lead the business as creative director, alongside Jersey City-based global managing director James Burns. When she stepped back, she says she felt that “the creative part” of the agency had become less of a focal point. Stein had helped grow the business and prioritised the “operational excellence” of the agency, helping the company become “established” and “a safe pair of hands” for creatives. However, at that point Bright was outsourcing “a lot of editorial help”, hiring consultants and relying less on the expertise of its agents and their ability to develop talent. “What I wanted to bring back was almost putting the creative heart back into Bright,” the founder says. The agency represents stars, including multi-
ple award-winner Yasmeen Ismail, Chris Chatterton, Supertato creators Sue Hendra and Paul Linnet, one of Simon & Schuster Children’s Books’ biggest brands, and author-illustrator Benji Davies, whose classic The Storm Whale was also published by S&S in the UK.
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Bologna Children’s Book Fair
Company Spotlight
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