Blessed Earth, an educational nonprofit founded by Tyndale House Publishers authors Matthew and Nancy Sleeth, was recently awarded a nearly $1.5 million grant to work with churches and seminaries on Sabbath-living practices in the next three years. 

Awarded by the Duke Endowment, the grant will “help clergy and their congregations step back from the demands of our 24/7 world and begin adopting healthier, more balanced 24/6 lives,” said Matthew Sleeth, executive director of Blessed Earth and a former emergency room (ER) doctor.

Black Friday may be getting all the attention as the holiday shopping season closes in, but a recent ShopperTrak study indicates that the annual discount-laden retail spree may not be the ideal time to shop. Rather, with smaller crowds, the weekdays immediately following “Black Weekend” are expected to be some of the best days to hit stores this year, according to the study.

ShopperTrak, a shopper analytics provider, has identified the 10 days between Thanksgiving and Christmas likely to have the least amount of in-store holiday shopper traffic, making them the best days to shop for consumers looking to do their shopping in a less frenzied environment.

Amazon.com is working with the U.S. Postal Service to deliver packages to Amazon Prime members on Sunday, starting in the Los Angeles and New York metropolitan areas. Amazon and the U.S. Postal Service plan to roll out this service to a large portion of the U.S. in 2014, including Dallas, Houston and Phoenix, to name a few.

“If you’re an Amazon Prime member, you can order a backpack for your child on Friday and be packing it for them Sunday night,” said Dave Clark, Amazon’s vice president of worldwide operations and customer service. “We’re excited that now every day is an Amazon delivery day, and we know our Prime members, who voraciously shop on Amazon, will love the additional convenience they will experience as part of this new service.”

HarperCollins Christian Publishing has hired Dylan Hillhouse as vice president of marketing for the Bible group. Hillhouse brings more than 20 years of industry experience to the role as he provides marketing leadership for both the Thomas Nelson and Zondervan Bibles and study resources products, creating strategic campaigns that focus on the uniqueness of each brand.

Hillhouse was brought to the HarperCollins Christian team to foster excellence, creativity and innovation within the Bible team to help Thomas Nelson and Zondervan engage with new and loyal readers of God’s Word. Previously responsible for the oversight of Mardel Christian stores’ Bible merchandising program, Hillhouse brings hands-on Bible-selling experience to the team.

Fifteen Minutes, the latest standalone by Karen Kingsbury, took the No. 1 spot on the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association (ECPA) Fiction best-seller list for the week ending Nov. 2.

The top 20 ECPA General best-sellers were: 1. You’ll Get Through This, Max Lucado (Thomas Nelson); 2. Jesus Calling, Sarah Young, hardcover (Thomas Nelson); 3. Four Blood Moons, John Hagee (Worthy Publishing); 4. Fifteen Minutes, Kingsbury (Howard Books); 5. Jesus Calling, Young, large print deluxe (Thomas Nelson); 6. Outlaw, “Outlaw” No. 1, Ted Dekker (FaithWords); 7. The Reason for My Hope, Billy Graham (Thomas Nelson); 8. Jesus Calling, Young, women’s edition (Thomas Nelson); 9. The Harbinger, Jonathan Cahn (FrontLine); 10. The 5 Love Languages, Gary Chapman (Northfield Publishing); 11. Jesus Calling, Young, deluxe (Thomas Nelson); 12. The Equipping Church, Sue Mallory (Zondervan); 13. The Duck Commander Devotional (Howard Books); 14. Jesus Today, Young (Thomas Nelson); 15. Si-cology 1, Si Robertson, Mark Schlabach (Howard Books); 16. The Power of Right Believing, Joseph Prince (FaithWords); 17. One Thousand Gifts, Ann Voskamp (Zondervan); 18. Journey, David Jeremiah (FaithWords); 19. Wounded by God’s People, Anne Graham Lotz (Zondervan); and 20. What Are You Afraid Of?, Jeremiah (Tyndale House Publishers).

Love & the Outcome took home four awards as GMA Canada presented its 35th Annual Covenant Awards in Burlington, Ontario on Nov. 6. The Canadian duo, whose self-titled debut album (Word Records/Word Distribution) was released in August, won New Artist of the Year and were presented with three awards for the group’s hit single “He Is With Us”—Song of the Year, Recorded Song of the Year and Pop/Contemporary Song of the Year.

“We are blown away by the love and support of the Canadian Christian music industry and all of our friends and family who have walked this road with us,” said Love & The Outcome’s Jodi King. “We toured this beautiful country living out of our Jetta for two years, which is where the song ‘He Is With Us’ came from. We are so amazed by how God is using our story!”

Texas company known for Scourby KJV audio Bible ‘moves to new level’ in a changing marketplace

Casscom Media is building its business through key partnerships, including an agreement with Scandinavia Publishing House based in Copenhagen, Denmark. 

Specializing in the co-production of such products as children’s Bibles and gift books, Scandinavia is “one of the largest publishers of children’s Christian products in the world,” said Don Greve, vice president of marketing at Greenville, Texas-based Casscom, which is perhaps best known for its work duplicating the King James audio Bible narrated by Alexander Scourby.

Six years ago, Casscom President Dwain Moyer rehired Greve, who was involved in Casscom’s founding, to “move Casscom to a new level in the marketplace that’s changing,” Greve told Christian Retailing.

“We’ve become a full publisher with Scandinavia, with Rick Green, with Jim Stovall, different people that publish different things that are really powerful for the Christian market,” Greve said. “We provide the fulfillment and we provide the marketing and we provide the art. We’ll do any aspect of it except the creative portion, which somebody else does, and then we join with them.”

Clearly committed to the Christian retailer, Casscom reported a successful show with three of its reps busy writing orders from stores at September’s CPE Murfreesboro hosted by Munce Group.

“We think the retailer today is under great stress, stress that’s coming from Internet marketers that are kind of like pirates,” Greve said. “They steal other people’s business and they don’t really do anything to help the marketplace, and they don’t have the overhead that brick-and-mortar stores have.”

Greve said that Casscom aims “to take high-quality products and keep our customers competitive so that it is a fact that you can go to their retail brick-and-mortar store and buy for an amount maybe even less than what’s sold on the Internet, but certainly they can be competitive with it. It isn’t that people don’t like to buy at brick-and-mortar stores, they just don’t want to pay extra for the privilege, so it’s our commitment to provide quality products at bargain and fair prices that our retailers can make money on and do well.”