It’s time for the reporting of annual publishing statistics and as usual, the most profound numbers for us are the unreported ones. The bigger and more technologically-fueled book publishing gets, the less we actually know about the universe in which we all work. It all comes back to the metadata mess, in which many newer players do not use standard identifiers at all for their books, and even traditional players have not agreed on a single practice. The “known universe” clearly continues to expand, and we infer that the darker “unknown universe” is doing the same. Today, Bowker’s Books In […]
Statistics
Authors: Roth Wins Man Booker International, with Controversy; Nesbo Opening Week Sales; and More
Knopf has been positioning Jo Nesbo‘s THE SNOWMAN as its big summer thriller breakout, and they report selling 20,000 total copies so far of the May 10 release – with digital making up as much as 65 percent, at 13,000 units sold. Since every media outlet under the sun has wondered whether Nesbo is “the next Stieg Larsson,” it’s worth noting that THE SNOWMAN exceeded sales of THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO by 2,000 units during the same time frame. “The Larsson comp is significant because it demonstrates how much shift there has been in our business in under […]
eBook Sales Set Another Record, But Can’t Outpace the Decline in Print
eBooks indisputably comprise a significant portion of trade revenues following the Christmas boom in ereading-capable devices, confirmed by another record ebook sales tally from among the 14 publishers who report. The AAP data also shows what publishers’ net shipments look like in a world in which no one is sending books to Borders. February ebook sales totaled $90.3 million, significantly ahead of the record $69.9 million reported the previous month. In January ebooks were the second-largest trade segment, behind trade paperbacks, but in February they moved ahead as the single largest-selling format (with trade paperbacks at $81.2 million). Just as […]
Bookselling and Beyond: Reporting Borders’ Sales?, Creditors Meeting, and Waterstone’s Cuts
Recently we reported on the significant year-over-year drop in print book sales for the first six sales weeks of 2011 through outlets measured by Nielsen Bookscan. So naturally we were wondering how people should expect the discounted book sales at the 200 stores that Borders intends to close to be reflected in the Bookscan data as those stores are liquidated. Borders told us the handling of data for those 200 stores was up to Nielsen; they, in turn, indicate that they will continue to report sales from all Borders Group stores as usual, including those that are in the process […]
In the UK In 2010, Book Sales and New Book Production Decline
New book production in the UK declined slightly in 2010 according to preliminary figures from Nielsen Book, remaining robust at 151,969 titles. That is a 3.2 decline from 2009’s final count of 157,039 titles, and still the second-highest total recorded. (Nielsen notes that in 2009, the final count was considerably higher than the preliminary tally.) Overall sales volume as measured by Nielsen BookScan UK’s total consumer market tabulation puts UK book sales for 2010 at 229.3 million units (down 2.7 percent) and 1.72 billion pounds in consumer revenues (down 1.7 percent). Those figures are based on an unusual 53-week sales […]
What Does Borders’ Decline Do to Book Sales?
Everyone wants to know the impact of Borders reduction and potential disappearance on the market for printed books. The conventional wisdom, as one publisher told us, is that a third to half of Borders’ market share will be captured by other sellers, while the rest could simply disappear in lost sales. With Nielsen BookScan updating their weekly data earlier today, which they estimate covers 75 percent of physical retail sales, we thought it would be interesting to look at the last six weeks of sales–covering most of the period since Borders stopped paying vendors. Of course it’s hard to separate […]