Print sales drop in US, UK in 2022

In the US, Publishers Weekly has reported that sales of print books fell by 6.5% in 2022 compared to 2021, at outlets that report to NPD BookScan.

Sales totalled 788.7 million units in 2022, down from 843.1 million in 2021, but print unit sales for the year remained 11.8% above those in the last pre-pandemic year of 2019.

In 2022, sales fell steepest in frontlist and hardback. Frontlist sales (-10.5%) dropped more than backlist sales (-3.7%), while hardback sales fell 10.4% and represent 30% of the market, down from 33% the previous year. Sales of trade paperbacks fell only 2.4% and account for 60% of unit sales in 2022, up from 57% in 2021.

Publishers Weekly credited the increase in print sales of adult fiction (+8.5%) to the influence of BookTok. Sales declined in adult nonfiction (-10.3%), juvenile fiction (-8.8%) and YA nonfiction (-4.6%), but held fairly steady in YA fiction (-0.2%).

In the UK, the Bookseller reported that ‘the print market’s pandemic boom of recent years began to be eroded by the cost-of-living crisis, with volume falling 2.2% and value dropping 1.4% against the available weeks of 2021’.

Category: International news