Industry Statistics

In our first installment of blended statistics that combine standard industry measures with data slices from Authors Earnings and our own research and adjustments, we looked at the 2016 market for individually sold ebooks. In that paid download market, the one in which traditional publishers conduct nearly all of their business, publishers captured 80 percent of the dollar sales, but only about 53 percent of the unit sales. We also showed that, within Amazon’s US Kindle store on its own, 53 percent of the unit sales are “house sales,” distributed and/or published by Amazon. But the larger hole in the […]

The AAP released sales statistics for December and full-year 2016 (and yes, they are almost two months behind last year’s reporting schedule). The year finished with a decline in December, with low trade sales as well as higher revised sales data for December 2015. Sales registered $546 million — compared to a revised total of $602 million for December 2015 (which was originally reported a year ago at $585.5 million or just below flat compared to 2014). That put the final month of the year down 9.3 percent. Adult books saw declines in trade paperbacks, mass market, and ebooks; as […]

The AAP released their monthly StatShot statistics for November 2016, which provide solid evidence of the disconnect between topline AAP data and actual marketplace results that we have been talking about for a while now. Looked at in isolation the headline news sounds positive: Net trade sales as measured by the AAP rose 8.6 percent in November, up $63.3 million, to $732.1 million for the month. Yet we know from Bookscan (and Barnes & Noble) that actual consumer sales of books fell sharply in the first couple of weeks around the election, and for the four sales weeks ending November 27, […]

After rebounding to nearly flat at the end of the third quarter, trade sales as measured by the reporting AAP publishers fell $67.5 million in October, a decline of a 8.8 percent, at $701 million. The primary difference was significantly lower adult hardcover shipments — reflecting a new release schedule that pushed big fall books away from the election. Gross shipments to accounts of adult hardcovers were $71 million lower than a year ago, at $243 million. As we had predicted in the past, however, ebook sales finally look to have found their new level, following the completion of the […]