Scott Tilson

Scott L. Tilson
Born (1963-05-11) May 11, 1963
Baltimore, Maryland, United States
Nationality American
Occupation Businessman
Known for Poetry.com, Stamp Collection,[1] Entrepreneurship

Scott Tilson (born May 11, 1963) is an American businessman who owned poetry.com[2] and is the founder of "The International Collectors Society".[3] He is also the co-owner of "Psychedelic Art Exchange".[4]

Career

Tilson started his business career at the age of 15, buying and selling rare United States coins under the name "Scott Tilson Rare Coins" while at the same time pursuing his graduation at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.[5]

In 1992, Tilson, along with his new business partner Jeffrey Franz, launched "The International Collectors Society" (ICS). [3][6] The ICS operated by mass-market advertising, pushing its products via supermarket tabloids and magazines rather than the specialist hobby media used by most stamp dealerships.[5] Initially, the company was formed with the idea of distributing Elvis Presley memorabilia, but when this endeavour failed to take off Franz and Tilson returned to postage stamps.[5] ICS was sued by The Beatles in 1996 for distributing copyright-infringing stamps from Chad, Madagascar, Tanzania and Abkhazia.[7]

Purchase of Poetry.com

In June 1997, Tilson, along with Franz, purchased Poetry.com from Cendant Corporation. The business became a large poetry publisher in the world. The company grew to over 2,000,000 paying members and they held conventions 3 times per year, each of which was attended by over 2500 poets from over 4 nations. The company was sold in 2005 in a $9,000,000 transaction to New Catalyst Fund. New Catalyst Fund sold the business to LuLu.com on March 7, 2009.[2]

On April 14, 2011, LuLu.com announced that they were closing Poetry.com on May 4, 2011. On May 11, 2011, Tilson re-purchased Poetry.com from LuLu.com for ten dollars. The site is home to the largest community of amateur poets on the Internet.

Education

Tilson received his schooling from The Park School in Brooklandville, Maryland in 1981 and graduated from Northwestern University in 1985 with a B.A. in economics.

Personal life

Tilson moved with his family to Park City, Utah in June 2005. He has been married to his wife Suzanne since 1990.[8] They have three children, Kyle (born 1994) and Brooke and Grant (born 1997).

References

  1. ↑ "Stamp hobby turns into good business". Google News. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
  2. 1 2 "Warning of possible poetry scam". Got Poetry?. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
  3. 1 2 "Philatelists Just Wanna Have Fun". New York Times. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
  4. ↑ "BBB Business Review". Better Business Bureau. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
  5. 1 2 3 "Pair Post Big Profits in World of Stamps". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
  6. ↑ "GUYANA-UNITED STATES: Simpsonmania grabs stamp collectors". IPS News. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
  7. ↑ Carlozo, Lou (19 Nov 1996). "You Can't Do That". Chicago Tribune.
  8. ↑ "Supermarket pursuitDid you know that:There are five..." BaltimoreSun.com. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
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