'Changed retail landscape' pushed sales growth in 2015

A revitalised bricks and mortar offer, new routes to readers and healthy exports are among the key elements that combined to create “a new landscape” for the trade in 2015, with publishers saying last year’s market growth is sustainable—despite a drop in digital sales.

As we have revealed over our Review of the Year features, the print market soared last year by 6.6% by value (through Nielsen BookScan’s 52 weeks; 8.4% if adding its extra 53rd week). In our look at publishers’ print performances this issue (pp20–25), we see that the groups at the top, and particularly middle, of the table have on the whole had very good years.

This is despite 2015’s drop in e-book volume sales (see analysis, right). The Bookseller has been canvassing the Big Five publishers for their full-year e-unit sales since 2012, and 2015 marked the first year of collective decline. However, this was not unexpected. The dramatic triple-digit percentage growth of the early part of this decade had been levelling off, dropping to a comparatively modest 15.3% rise for the Big Five in 2014.

Most publishers have taken digital’s volume decline as merely a recalibration of the market. “It remains the case that five years or so in [from e-books’ breakthrough], e-books haven’t found their place,” said Pan Mac m.d. Anthony Forbes Watson. “We’ve enjoyed e-books a lot, but we’ve tried to sense where e-books are in the copyright life cycle and I suspect that they are a vital but subsidiary element. Print is the resurgent and priority element that not only is the heritage format but, for readers, the emotional format.”

Faber c.e.o. Stephen Page agreed, saying: “Digital was not as strong for some, but I think this is part of the mixed model we are in, which includes a revitalised Waterstones and a resurgent independent bookshop sector. It’s a completely changed retail landscape.”

A beneficiary of the changed landscape was Europa Editions, which profited last year with Elena Ferrante, who the indie first published in 2012 “to resounding silence”, said Europa UK director Daniela Petracco. She added: “A lot changed for us last year. Readers have become amenable to embracing less obvious books and I also have the impression that quite a few bookshops opened in 2015 (although a few closed), which is a good sign. There is something different and very creative behind these new bookshops . . . Booksellers have become curators and not just stockists.”

One of the huge booms last year in print was in adult colouring books, which enabled some of the big players in that market to have huge jumps in their BookScan numbers, led by Laurence King (+173% to £7.4m), Michael O’Mara (+148% to £8.1m) and Pavilion (+100% to £6.9m). But for Michael O’Mara m.d. Lesley O’Mara, the TCM tells just part of the story, with the publisher actively looking to special sales and “off-BookScan” outlets. She said: “It’s finding the niches where people are really enjoying the books. For example, we explored the art book field and we took on some more reps last year to get into the crafts and art market. It’s a new area for us and doing really well. The market is definitely there, you just have to go out and find it.”

Most insiders say that the colouring craze is unlikely to last at current levels—especially arts and crafts- focused publishers themselves. O’Mara stressed that MOM was not “putting all its eggs in one basket”.

Yet many argue that last year’s overall success will continue. Head of Zeus c.e.o. Amanda Ridout said: “When one unpicks the stats, there’s a positive underlying trend. Publishers are still producing a strong, wide range of titles, and booksellers are really helping to sell them. We are cautiously optimistic.”

Publishers were extremely bullish about sales outside the UK borders, with Ireland and Australia flagged up as particularly strong territories.

Jon Butler, m.d. at a resurgent Quercus, said: “ What really excites me is the growth we saw in our digital and export markets. We relaunched the Stieg Larsson series with 100,000 hardbacks of The Girl in the Spider’s Web in the UK, but sold four times as many copies of our edition elsewhere in the world. That hints at a huge opportunity for any publisher that is willing to look up from the UK retail landscape, and treat it as just one part of an internationally buoyant book market.”

Tom Tivnan and Kiera O'Brien analyse the performance of publishers in 2015