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Trade experiences worst March since 2005
07.04.11 | Philip Stone and Graeme Neill
Spending in March has hit a six-year low, with sales slumping by 8.7% year on year.
According to figures from Nielsen BookScan, shoppers spent £103.3m at UK booksellers in the four weeks to 2nd April, down £8.98m on last year. Volume sales fared worse, diving 12.2% to 14.2m on the same period last year. However, average selling price nudged up 4.0% to £7.26.
According to BookScan Top 5,000 bestseller list data from the four-week period, fiction sales fell 11%, or £2.8m, year on year. The fiction decline is mainly due to a 17% volume slump in sales of crime, thriller or adventure books, in particular those of Stieg Larsson. While each title in the Millennium Trilogy was selling around 70,000 copies in March last year, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo sold 17,895 in March 2011.
Non-fiction fared better last month, with category value sales for the TCM top 5,000 up 7% to £1.1m, driven by an upsurge in biography and memoir.
Children's sales also fell 15%, or £2.0m, to £11.8m. While kids fiction sales are up on 2010, young adult fiction continues to struggle amid the ongoing decline in sales of Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series.
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Lately, I come across a lot of people reading on their various electronic devices but there is no mention of ebook sales in these figures.
I wonder how much of an impact they would have in the reported declining sales.
From a BBC report yesterday
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12978313
"Of all the money currently being spent on supermarket groceries, some 40% is now being spent on items that are either discounted or on special offer.
That is a record, according to Nielsen, the consumer analysts."
Why on earth should the booktrade expect hard-print book sales not to be affected by the current economic climate.
In the last fortnight, here in the south west, a 14 shop jewellery and giftware chain employing 55 people (turnover £3.9million in 2009) went into administration and shop closure - this didn't even rate a mention in the local, yet alone the national press.
These are tough times in all retail, especially on the high street.
Don't blame slump on decline in Stieg Larson and Stephenie Meyer sales......blame it on 1,000,000 books being dumped on the market for the WBN initiative. This plus the T.V programmes was supposed to focus attention on books and increase sales. How ironic that the opposite happened! Let's hope we don't have it again next year.
spot on dude!!!
Another factor for the decline in book sales apart from the economy is that there are no inspiring books or pretty much anything that jumps out at anybody.
Lazy and "cautious" publishers have consistantly put all their eggs in one basket chasing the latest Stephanie Myer/Dan Brown/Stieg fad. If it's not Stieg or Stephanie or like Stieg or Stephanie or a repackaged Stieg or Stephanie with coloured pages, it doesn't make it onto the shelves. You can only ride that fad for so long and when people have Stieg or Stephanie fatigue all they are left with are shelved full of Stephanie or Stieg like choices...which customers no longer want.
The trade needed World Book Night but it needed it to WORK.
WBN never worked out whether it was a media event or a trade event. As a media event it worked, as at trade event it didn't.
It still has potential. But please, if it happens again can we have a little more 'proof of concept' and a little less instinct. Giveaways of accessible books to non-book-buyers has some merit. The 25 titles were great titles. The sort to be loved and appreciated by heavy-book-buyers. But that was the fundamental flaw. There was little scope to increase the market but every likelihood that the core market who but 10+ books a year, will this year buy one less.
On the Sunday following World Book Night, many customers asked if we had the books that were featured on the 'debut fiction' show, so we found that it did drive people in to make book purchases. Even now, people still ask if we have the books that were featured and are still buying them, so I think WBN did get people buying and trying new books.
Strange. My shops sales were up...
I agree with a number of the comments,our sales are up and yes we did get customers buying other titles. But i hope WBN does not turn into an industry pat on the back for organisers and free books for consumers, remember its the bookshops who work hard to sell all year round and more support needs to be directed towards the independents.I was informed that one local church had 500 books?? and one giver was moving business premises and used it to curry favour at his new location? ( was this the objective) so yes it must have taken away purchases from local shops. Why can't book shops give away the free books at least that way we get the opportunity to sell up.
Frustrating for all when Indies and new authors barely get a mention. There are so many good pieces of work that are under the radar - not even a decent positive blip in their sales figures.
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