US print sales up in 2015

US trade publishers' print sales grew 2.3% in 2015 to $15.83bn in revenue, while downloaded audio sales have almost doubled since 2012, according to the latest statistics released by the Association of the American Publishers (AAP).

The growth in print sales prompted Tina Jordan, vice president of the AAP, to declare “the paper book, just like the e-book, is here to stay”.

However, while print sales grew, overall the industry showed a marginal decline, with overall sales including digital falling 0.6% from $27.96bn in 2014 to $27.78bn in 2015, which the report said was "largely due to a challenging year in the education markets", which comprise about one-third of tracked revenues.

The StatShot annual statistics, produced by AAP, collects sales data in dollars and units from nearly 1,800 active US publishers directly, with the help of distributors. However, it does not measure self-published books and e-books.

In trade, adult books grew by almost $90m in revenue, up 6% from $9.87bn in 2014 to $10.47bn in 2015. For the second year running, adult non-fiction books, which includes adult colouring books, was the category that sold the most units and provided the most revenue in the trade category. Within the Adult Books category, downloaded audio was the fastest-growing , up 45.9%, with hardback the second fastest-growing in terms of revenue, up 15.1%. Adult paperback sales were up 9.1% in 2015, meanwhile.

Overall, audio sales grew 37.6% in revenue, from $299m to $552m in 2015, and was up 41.1% in units. However e-books sales declined by 11.3% in 2015 to $2.84bn.

Tina Jordan, vice president, AAP said: “StatShot Annual 2015 has confirmed print’s marked return. The paper book, just like the e-book, is here to stay. While young adult titles were very popular last year, in 2015 adult books led the charge with successes like The Girl on the Train and Go Set a Watchman. Those, and adult colouring books like The Secret Garden, helped the adult books category grow by nearly $90m in revenue.”

Children’s/ young adult books declined 3.4% in revenue in 2015, from $4.42bn in 2014 to $4.27bn. The fastest-growing Children’s category in terms of units sold were board books, up 14%. Downloaded audio was up 1.2% and hardback was up 1%. E-books saw a 35.0% decline in units sold in 2015 versus 2014.

Online retail was the top sales channel for publishers’ revenue in the trade category - it took 37.4% of the market, selling 806m units in 2015 - but physical store sales were nonetheless up, growing 1.8% from $4.08bn to $4.15bn in 2015