Atwood Tate

What Atwood Tate does

Atwood Tate, operating legally as The Wonderful Ideas Project and trading as Wonderful Consultancy, is a UK-based specialist publishing consultancy headquartered in Teddington. The firm is founded and operated by Dan Shepherd and Dean Chance, two publishing industry veterans whose combined experience spans over 45 years across corporate and independent publishing houses including DK, Penguin, Penguin Random House UK, Carlton Publishing Group, Welbeck Publishing, and Igloo Books. The company's value proposition is grounded in this "lived experience," positioning the founders as practitioner-advisors rather than theoretical strategists, and explicitly references having held roles from entry-level to C-suite within client-side operations.

The firm delivers a single core service—publishing consultancy—covering strategic planning, business restructuring, leadership coaching, mergers and acquisitions support, digital transformation advisory, rights management, marketing, distribution optimization, training, and market entry support. The service catalogue extends into adjacent creative industries including entertainment, music, events, and licensing. The go-to-market motion is sales-led and relationship-driven, relying on founders' industry reputations and personal networks rather than formal marketing channels. The business model is professional services revenue combining long-term retained engagements with one-off project work. The two principals also operate complementary ventures—a recruitment business and a learning and development consultancy—which keep them embedded in current publishing trends, talent flows, and client development pipelines.

The company operates at small scale: five total employees, no disclosed funding, no public listing, no external institutional investors, and no proprietary technology products, software platforms, or AI/ML capabilities disclosed. Revenue figures, customer counts, engagement pricing, and financial KPIs are not publicly disclosed. The offering is entirely human-delivered advisory services with no underlying software product, platform architecture, or technology stack described in available source material.

Name

Atwood Tate

Legal name

The Wonderful Ideas Project

Website

https://wonderfulideasproject.com

Company type

Private

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Short description

Atwood Tate (trading as The Wonderful Ideas Project / Wonderful Consultancy) is a UK-based, founder-led publishing consultancy delivering strategic planning, restructuring, leadership coaching, M&A support, and digital transformation advisory to UK publishers and adjacent creative-industries clients, operated by Dan Shepherd and Dean Chance.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Publishing Consulting Services

NAICS

Management Consulting Services (54161), Marketing Consulting Services (541613)

SIC

Services-Management Consulting Services (8742)

akta.pro industry

PRIMARYBPAHACAG

Customer, Marketing & Sales Consulting

Business & Public Services/Professional Services (Legal, Accounting, Consulting)/Management Consulting

Keywords

• Publishing consultancy
• Strategic advisory
• Leadership coaching
• Business restructuring
• Mergers acquisitions advisory

Headquarters

HQ city

Teddington

HQ country

United Kingdom

HQ region

Europe

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Marketing or Sales

Revenue model

1. Consulting Services: Professional consultancy services provided to publishing and creative industry clients. The company serves both long-term retained clients and organizations requiring one-off project support across strategic planning, restructuring, leadership coaching, and market expansion.

Go-to-market motion1 record

Core offering

Atwood Tate (The Wonderful Ideas Project) operates a publishing consultancy that provides strategic planning, business restructuring, leadership coaching, team development, and market expansion support to publishers and creative industry organisations. Services are delivered by two founders with combined 45+ years of publishing experience, covering commercial strategy, M&A support, business reviews, digital transformation, rights management, marketing, author development, distribution optimisation, editorial planning, training, and international market entry. The firm serves both long-term retained clients and organisations seeking one-off project support.

Product overview

Wonderful Publishing Consultancy is a single service offering (not a software product) provided by The Wonderful Ideas Project. It operates as a consulting firm for publishing businesses, offering services including commercial strategy, mergers & acquisitions support, business restructuring, C-suite coaching, non-executive support, business reviews, digital transformation, rights management, marketing, author development, distribution optimization, strategy & editorial planning, training, and market entry assistance. The consultancy is operated by founders Dan Shepherd and Dean Chance, who also own and run a recruitment business and a learning & development consultancy.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Wonderful Publishing Consultancy

Segments2 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Partnerships

One partnership is on record.

• Specialist Industry VoicesminorOthersThe consultancy maintains relationships with specialist industry voices who can be engaged to support client engagements where additional expertise is needed beyond the core team.

Scale indicators1 record

Recent moves4 records

Expansion highlights3 records

Broad incumbents

• Accenture: Global consulting firm with media industry practice delivering digital transformation, technology integration, and operating model work for publishers and content businesses. Comparable in transformation and technology consulting scope.
• McKinsey & Company: Global management consultancy with a dedicated Media & Entertainment practice serving publishers on strategy, M&A, and digital transformation. Overlaps in service offering (strategy, M&A, restructuring) but operates at vastly larger scale across multiple industries.
• Nielsen Book (NielsenIQ): Book industry data and advisory arm of NielsenIQ serving publishers with market intelligence, distribution analytics, and commercial strategy consulting. Overlaps with Wonderful's marketing, audience development, and commercial strategy offerings.
• Bain & Company: Global strategy consultancy with media and publishing client engagements covering commercial strategy, M&A, and operating model design. Provides similar advisory services but from a horizontal, large-firm platform rather than a publishing-niche boutique.
• Deloitte: Big Four advisory with media and TMT practices offering strategy, digital transformation, and operational consulting to publishers. Overlaps with Wonderful's digital transformation, restructuring, and M&A support capabilities at significantly larger scale.

Others

• Publishers Association: UK trade body representing publishers. Not a direct competitor, but a relevant ecosystem participant whose members overlap with Wonderful's client base and whose research shapes the strategic context for publisher advisory work.

Regional players

• The Publishing Training Centre: UK-based training and development provider for the publishing industry. Adjacent rather than directly competing: Wonderful delivers strategic consulting while PTC delivers training, but both serve the same vertical with overlapping client lists.

Direct peers

• The Literary Consultancy: London-based editorial and publishing consultancy offering manuscript assessment, editorial development, and publishing strategy support. Comparable as a UK boutique advisory serving publishers and authors across strategic and editorial mandates.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat2 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/atwood-tate

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles2 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Atwood Tate