As an educational publishing company[1] Grolier was known for its presence in school libraries and its in-home encyclopedia sales.

It also had a strong presence among parents of children under six years old, the market for Grolier's direct mail-to-the-home business.

In 1910, Jackson purchased the rights to publish the British The Children's Encyclopædia under the name The Book of Knowledge.

[11] Murphy encouraged a productive rivalry among the subsidiaries, giving their executives broad authority and profit-sharing incentives.

[12] In 1968, Grolier's annual sales were over $181 million,[13] and the company held a 30 percent market share as the leading publisher of encyclopedias in the United States.

[22] In 1995, Grolier acquired Children's Press, moving its operations from Chicago to New York City and Danbury, Connecticut.

[25] Staff reductions as a means of controlling costs followed soon thereafter, even while an effort was made to augment the sales force.

Cuts occurred every year between 2000 and 2007, leaving a much-depleted work force to carry out the duties of maintaining a large encyclopedia database.

[26] Scholastic, which specializes in works for the K-8 market (Kindergarten-to-8th grade), has sought to position the Encyclopedia Americana as a reference resource for schools.

It remains to be seen whether that strategy, applied to a venerable upper-level (even adult-level) publication, will work in the long run.

When editors Neal Porter, Richard Jackson and Melanie Kroupa left Orchard for DK in 1996, Grolier sued the trio.

[31] They made electronic encyclopedias for the Amiga and video games for DOS, Windows, Macintosh and the PlayStation.