About Us

Nasionale Pers was established in 1915. During the first decade of its existence, the company focused primarily on the publishing of newspapers; the publishing of books received little attention. Reviews of books and debates about authors did, however, occasionally appear in Die Burger.

In the twenties Nasionale Pers started publishing an increasing number of books under the sun logo, particularly works by Afrikaans authors and poets such as Langenhoven, Leipoldt, Celliers and Totius, as well as school and university textbooks.

Nasionale Boekhandel was established in 1950 as an independent business with outside shareholders. Its main business was to publish books. The Naspers rising sun logo was replaced with a full sun, signalling the arrival of Nasionale Boekhandel. Within five years the company's turnover tripled. In 1973 Nasionale Boekhandel became a subsidiary of Nasionale Pers.

Initially the new business focused on school textbooks, but the revival of Afrikaans a decade later led to a flood of Afrikaans literary works being published and later to takeovers of well-known publishers such as Tafelberg (1959), Human & Rousseau (1977), JL van Schaik (1986) and Queillerie (1996).

In 1992 the company gained an interest in an English publisher with the takeover of Jonathan Ball Publishers. HarperCollins SA was taken over in 1994.

Over the years the Via Afrika group expanded the business through diversification. Reference works and dictionaries were published, later book clubs were launched (Leisure Books/Leserskring) and an academic bookstore (Van Schaik) was acquired. The Via Afrika group also branched out into stationery and distance education, and more recently into publishing religious books (Lux Verbi.BM) and distribution (On the Dot Distribution).

Since 1992 Via Afrika, as the group became known in 2000, has undergone rapid changes to adapt to the new constitutional realities of the country. These changes were spurred on by the so-called education crisis in 1997/8. Companies with shared interests were merged (eg Nasou and Via Afrika), new ones created and businesses that did not form part of the core business of the group were sold or closed down. Kwela was established to provide for the needs of previously disadvantaged authors and readers, and the black empowerment group Thebe acquired an interest in Via Afrika's educational businesses.

Among the highlights of the past 50 years are the typographical modernisation and redesign of the group's products in the sixties, the creation of successful black partnerships in the seventies, content renewal as a result of takeovers of several valuable back lists and titles, the publishing of a vast number of major poetry volumes and anthologies, the many creative works in all the national languages that win top literary awards year after year and the systems upgrading over the past year.

In 1998 Via Afrika ventured into the new field of e-commerce with the launch of the Internet bookstore Kalahari.net. In the same year Van Schaik Online started trading with Unisa students on the internet, and in 1999 the electronic publisher Contentlot was launched.
Via Afrika recently expanded its business into Africa by establishing a school textbook publisher in Botswana.