Florida Trend Publisher Lynda Keever to Retire

Lynda Keever, Publisher

After 17 years as publisher of Florida Trend magazine, Lynda Keever will retire next April at age 62. Keever first came to Florida Trend in 1979 and quickly became the magazine’s top sales representative. After leaving to publish a local real estate title, she returned to Trend in 1991 as publisher and has served in that role longer than anyone aside from the magazine’s founder, Tampa businessman Harris Mullen.

Keever, who as publisher expanded Florida Trend’s circulation and visibility statewide, says she looks forward to turning over leadership to new hands. She will remain with Florida Trend, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, in a consulting role after leaving in April. She says she also plans to start a consulting business that works with publications outside the state.

“She has been a potent revenue generator,” an innovator of new sections and titles, a key guardian of the magazine’s excellence and a perceptive observer of trends in the business community,” said Andrew Corty, a corporate executive at the Times Publishing Company, which owns Florida Trend.

Corty praised Keever for “personifying the magazine in every corner of the state” and credited her for the magazine’s many consecutive years of profitability.

He said Keever’s “generous timetable” will allow plenty of time to select a successor who can work with Keever through the transition.

In 2001, Keever was named to the Florida Women's Hall of Fame. Then Gov. Jeb Bush described Keever as a woman "who has done extraordinary things" during a lifetime filled with support for education and economic development.