ABOUT US
Paul Bogaards
Paul Bogaards has directed some of the most successful book campaigns of the modern era. His advocacy on behalf of writers and their work is well known. At Alfred A. Knopf, he served as spokesperson and Director of Publicity and Media Relations for three decades, working alongside Sonny Mehta and his successor Reagan Arthur. Colleagues in the media appreciate his candor (they also return his phone calls).
Among the authors he has worked with and campaigns he has worked on: Andre Agassi, Julian Barnes, Lidia Bastianich, Robert Caro, Jim Carrey, John Carreyrou, Julia Child, Bill Clinton, Paulo Coelho, Michael Crichton, Stephanie Danler, Joan Didion, Bret Easton Ellis, James Ellroy, Nora Ephron, Katharine Graham, Garth Risk Hallberg, Tom Hanks, Carl Hiaasen, Kazuo Ishiguro, E L James’s Fifty Shades trilogy, Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, Stieg Larsson’s Millennium trilogy, Megha Majumdar, Emily St. John Mandel, Cormac McCarthy, Christopher McDougall, Toni Morrison, Jo Nesbø, Diane Rehm, Anne Rice, Sheryl Sandberg, Dani Shapiro, Sonia Sotomayor, Sharon Stone, Donna Tartt, Anne Tyler, Barbara Walters, and Dr. Andrew Weil.
Heather Brown
Heather started her career as a high school English teacher in Colorado. In 2013, after receiving an MFA in poetry from Oregon State University, Heather pivoted to book publicity. “As a longtime reader and teacher of English, I wanted to use my skills to help authors,” explains Heather, adding “one has to be pretty persuasive in 21st-century classroom environments.”
Heather now channels her talents for advocacy and organization into data-driven campaigns that connect authors with readers. Since 2015 she has collaborated with publishers, organizations, and individuals to provide communications and operations strategy and support. For five years, she organized and produced Lit Crawl(R) Portland in partnership with Literary Arts and has more recently provided PR support for their annual Portland Book Festival. *Her projects span literary genres, from Elana K. Arnold's What Girls Are Made Of (NBA Finalist for Young Adult Fiction) to Mira Rosenthal's poetry collection Territorial (University of Pittsburgh 2022).
Kate Downen
Kate Downen has spent more than 15 years directing communications and strategic public relations for companies, candidates, elected officials, NGOs and advocacy organizations. She comes equipped with a deep well of contacts and has strong relationships with media, interest groups and industry stakeholders.
At Zillow, Kate led a number of business-critical public relations and reputational campaigns, and at Uber, she won some of the toughest regulatory battles the company and industry faced.
Kate has also held roles at the highest levels of campaigns and government: serving as western states communications director for Everytown for Gun Safety, Michael Bloomberg’s gun violence prevention organization; chief spokesperson for U.S. Senator Max Baucus; senior advisor to Montana Governor Steve Bullock; and Montana director of communications for Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign.
Today, her work with creators ensures they are telling their story–in an authentic and impactful way–to the right audiences.
Kate earned her undergraduate degree at the University of Notre Dame where she chose modernist literature over Sunday mass. She lives in Portland, Oregon and spends a lot of time in her home state of Montana.
Stephanie Hauer
Stephanie Hauer is a recent graduate of Champlain College, where she earned a degree in Professional Writing and specialized in publishing. As a writer herself, she feels a kinship with the authors that BPR represents, and she’s grateful for the chance to support them. In addition to her position here, she works on collection maintenance and social media management at her local library. In both of these roles, she’s happy to connect readers with new stories for them to love. It brings her joy to work among peers who care about books as much as she does.
When she’s not writing or reading, Stephanie can usually be found sipping an iced chai tea latte and working on fiber arts.
Stephanie Kloss
For nearly seventeen years, Stephanie Kloss managed the print and digital marketing efforts of Penguin Random House’s Knopf imprint, creating beautiful and memorable ads, websites, social media campaigns, videos, and marketing materials. She helped launch Toni Morrison’s A Mercy, Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In, Stieg Larsson's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Haruki Murakami’s 1Q84, Bill Clinton's My Life, Patti Smith's M Train, Joan Didion’s The Year of Magical Thinking, and hundreds of other best-selling books. She even designed a few book covers.
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After leaving New York City and moving with her family to Vermont, she developed multichannel marketing campaigns for Champlain College. Strategies included digital advertising, email, video, print, and social media. More recently, she has been creating strategic marketing and communications plans, materials, and websites for the Stern Center for Language and Learning and other education-focused organizations. Her specialties include advertising, website design, social media, SEO strategy and execution, graphic design, and content marketing/storytelling.
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At Knopf, Stephanie and Paul worked on many successful campaigns together. They are happy to be joining forces again.
