Friday, July 29, 2005

Daniel Mears / The Detroit News Sireesha Mandava enjoys audio book during her commute. Nationwide, audio books have become an $800-million industry.

Audio books thrive in downsizing economy

Three-Leaf company rents motivational, training CDs employees use to improve skills.

By Dalia Naamani-Goldman / The Detroit News

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In good and poor economies, Stuart Newman's business seems to thrive.

It's not that he retools his business, but rather that other companies retool theirs. His 10-year-old Oak Park business, Three Leaf Group, rents motivational and training audiobooks to corporate businesses. Topics include "How to become CEO: The rules for rising to the top of any organization," "Stress management for professionals" and "Phone power: Increase your effectiveness every time you're on the phone."

"It's really a helping business," Newman said. "It's not a matter of taking advantage of bad circumstance or people suffering. It's a matter of helping companies help their people improve their skills in a time-effective, cost-effective manner."

Newman's theory is that when companies downsize, the first things to go are training and development programs. So for about $1 or $2 per audiobook, a company can educate and train its employees during their commutes, while they're doing minor tasks or on their own time, instead of spending thousands on travel and over-time for classes and seminars.

"For the price that it would cost them to send one person to a training seminar, they could have 500 resources available to 1,000 people," Newman said. "With downsizing, how can you ask someone to work more hours? With audiobooks, you're not taking time to do it."

Three Leaf creates a Web site for each company that lists selected topics available to employees. Employees click to order and the audiobooks show up in their mailboxes a few days later. Once they're finished, employees slip the audiobooks -- mostly CDs -- into the mail. Most rentals are for about two to three weeks.

Newman, who said his business has grown 80 percent since last year, is part of a growing trend.

Nationwide, audio books have become an $800 million industry, according to the Audio Publishers Association, an audio book industry analyst. Though most books available on audiotape are the same books on sale in bookstores, motivational tapes have become a big part of the business.

"It is kind of what the audiobooks business was founded on," said Anthony Goff, marketing director of Time Warner Audiobooks. "It led the way for people to listen to books."

Today about 25 percent of Time Warner's audiobook sales are in the motivational and self-help category. But some audio publishers have created entire businesses just in the motivational sector, Goff said.

"We're really growing at enormous clips," Goff said.

Several local and national companies have used Three Leaf, including DaimlerChrysler, Citizens Bank and the Veterans' Administration. Newman also said he has several government contracts.

NSF International, an Ann Arbor-based quality and standard testing company, uses the Three Leaf audiobooks in its new employee development program, said Carol Tessler, manager of training and organizational development.

According to Tessler, the CDs are a hit with NSF employees.

"We thought that this would be a good tool for them in this busy world to give them an option when they're traveling or doing some other activity to work on their own development," Tessler said. "The response was truly overwhelming. We thought it would be a benefit they would enjoy, but we had no idea to what extent."

NSF contracted with Three Leaf for four months of service. In the first month, at least 25 percent of the company's 450 employees took out at least one audiobook. The most popular subjects have been management, leadership and communication.

"There just continues to be an increase," Tessler said.

Sireesha Mandava, NSF's business applications manager for information technology, drives about half an hour to and from work each day. While she always used to take audiobooks out of the library, she now orders most of her selections through Three Leaf. In the four months the program has been in place, Mandava estimates she's listened to more than 10 audiobooks.

Though many businesses have fancy development programs such as adviser systems and communication programs, Mandava said finding things employees enjoy and can do on their own time is important.

"I don't think people use that," she said. "This is something that I can use it often and get something out of it."

You can reach Dalia Naamani-Goldman at (313) 222-2536 or dgoldman@detnews.com.