Germany looks to a last-minute Christmas

Christmas sales are picking up in Germany but with only two and a half shopping days left before the shops are legally bound to close at 1p.m. on Christmas Eve, booksellers are facing an uphill battle to finish ahead of 2013. Sales for the year were down by a marginal 1.4% at the end of November, but while the market has been rising week-on-week since November, the upward movement is markedly less dynamic than in 2013.

The German holiday season is traditionally defined by the four Sundays before Christmas. With shops closed on Sundays, statistics compiled by the trade publication Buchreport from 500 brick-and-mortar bookstores measure sales from Monday to Saturday. As always shopping started in earnest just mid-week before the first Sunday in Advent, which this year fell on November 30th.

Three weeks into December booksellers have reported week-on-week growth of 21%, 32% and 14% respectively. But compared to the same period in 2013 sales were down 4% and 2.8% in the first two and an alarming 11.4% in the most recent week. All hinges on the outcome of the current week, but with the general consensus that Germans leave their Christmas shopping, especially books, later every year, booksellers don’t seem to be unduly worried as yet.

Most are expecting sales to pick up in earnest now, with record last-minute sales expected from Monday to Wednesday. If this is enough waits to be seen. Post-Christmas sales are usually not a big money spinner in Germany with shops closed on Boxing Day as well.

And which books will Santa put under the Christmas tree? According to booksellers consumers are buying across the board with no specific must-have Christmas book emerging so far. Given German readers’ normally enormous appetite for British and American authors, these are surprisingly under-represented on the current Der Spiegel bestsellers list, apart from stalwart Ken Follett whose final book in the Century trilogy is ranked second. Instead German-speaking authors are dominating the list, with the number one spot occupied by Sebastian Fitzek’s latest psychological thriller Passagier 23 (Passenger 23).