This time of year, if you focus too much on weekly market sales reports without looking at the broader context – particularly the timing of Easter – you can get confused pretty easily. For the first quarter of 2022 (the 13 weeks ending April 2), print book sales as measured by NPD Bookscan registered 184 million units – 18 million units, or 9 percent, lower than the big first quarter in 2021. But three weeks later, following a good sales week leading in to Easter and natural falloff the following week, the true comparison was clearer – and better: Year-to-date […]
Industry Statistics
First Quarter Deals: Sales Remain At Record Levels, Even As Six-Figure Deals Soften
Following a record year in 2021 for US deal transactions as measured through our PM deal reports, it’s time for an update on deal trends from the first quarter of 2022. To recap the baseline, 2021 saw a surge in dealmaking in the first and second quarters, followed by a modest pullback in the third quarter and a finish to the year that was slightly ahead of the first pandemic uptick from late 2020. In the end, US deals were up 9.4 percent overall, and six-figure deals grew even more, up over 21 percent. Those results aligned with industry stats: […]
AAP Reports Adult Sales Flat, Children’s Up in January
The AAP announced statistics for January from their participating StatShot publishers, reporting total sales across the industry of $1.3 billion, 3.7 percent higher than last year. Trade sales were up 4.3 percent to $720.6 million. Adult sales were almost flat at $461.9 million, a 0.6 percent increase over January 2021, while children’s and YA sales continued to increase to $194 million, a 12 percent gain. Within children’s, hardcovers were up 11.5 percent, paperbacks were up 23.6 percent while ebooks fell 17.8 percent. In print, overall trade hardcover sales were $261.4 million, up 6.9 percent, and paperbacks sales were $250.6 million, […]
AAP Trade Sales Gained 11.9 Percent In 2021
The AAP reported December and full-year 2021 statistics from their pool of StatShot publishers and as expected, their data shows record high revenues and year-over-year increases in revenues for trade publishers. Trade sales reached $8.821 billion in 2021, up $935 million (or 11.9 percent) over 2020 — when sales gained $689 million in the final count (or 9.6 percent). NB that the final 2020 figures were revised downwards slightly, so those gains are little more modest than when first reported a year ago. Adult book sales hit $6.080 billion, up $622 million (or 11.4 percent), while children’s and young adult […]
2021: The Year In Deals, and the Stats Behind the Boom
Overall Stats As we documented during the year, deal activity boomed in the first two quarters of 2021: US deal reports were up about 19 percent overall, and six-figure deals rose even more. In the second half of the year, dealmaking remained steady with a strong period from 2020, with the biggest “major” deals jumping at year-end. By year end, total deals rose more in 2021 than in 2020, and six-figure deals or better were particularly strong. At the same time, translation deals came roaring back after falling in 2020. Specifically: – US deals were up 9.4 percent overall, even more than […]
Fourth Quarter Deals
Bringing one of our important new projects full cycle, here is our recap of deal statistics for the fourth quarter of 2021. As indicated in our three previous reports, US dealmaking continued to align roughly with consumer book sales, up a little bit in the fourth quarter after a softer third quarter and a robust first half of the year. Nonfiction and fiction deals both declined slightly compared to a big quarter in 2020, but remained near high points for the past five years, as children’s deals continued their uninterrupted growth — putting total deals for the quarter up 1 […]