Future Events News Service has acquired Celebrity Bulletin and plans to launch a website and email services to augment the news diary service’s existing fax newsletter and telephone services.
Terms of the acquisition were undisclosed, but all four researcher jobs have been safeguarded at what is believed to be Britain’s oldest diary news service.
‘We see the acquisition of Celebrity Bulletin as a perfect fit alongside our other services,’said FENS chief executive Tom Arms. ‘It will be an especially useful complement to our Entertainment Report.”
Arms said Celebrity Bulletin’s twice-weekly fax newsletter will continue along with its printed newsletter and phone-in service, but online versions will be added within weeks.
‘We will shortly be introducing a daily service deliverable by email and a celebrity database is on the cards which will utilise the massive background files held by Celebrity Bulletin,’he said.
The London franchise of Celebrity Bulletin, which was spun off from the New York and Los Angles titles of the same name in 1953, has served showbiz reporters in the British media for more than half a century with details celebrities’ appearances and activities.
For the past 35 years, it has been owned and run by Diane Oliver, who, at 73, has decided to sell up and move back to her native New York.
Oliver, who will stay on as a ‘Life President’and consultant to the title, said: ‘FENS is a great company which will take Celebrity Bulletin on to even greater heights. I am leaving it in good hands.”
FENS has been running for more than 20 years. It was started by Arms, a former diplomatic correspondent, with a diary of international news events. It has since added diary services for UK, business, entertainment and Middle East news events.
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