Canongate hails 'rewarding year' in 2018 as turnover increases

Canongate and Severn House have announced consolidated turnover up 24% to £11.9m in 2018, from £9.6m in 2017, with pre-tax profits of £966,272.

The results were hailed as a “rewarding year”, after 2017 saw the consolidated company report a pre-tax loss of £440,000, which it blamed on the September 2017 acquisition of Severn House and writing off "some sizeable unearned advances".

For Canongate alone, turnover rose to £9.5m in 2018 from £8.9m the year before, with a pre-tax profit of £456,000 in the year ending 31st December 2018, the company said. The surge was partly due to “record-breaking” backlist sales which increased 20% by volume and 49% by value to £3.34m, the publisher said.

Bestsellers for 2018 included Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat by Samin Nosrat, The Flame by Leonard Cohen, Robert Sears’ humour titles and Notes on a Nervous Planet by Matt Haig.

Canongate also saw growth in e-book turnover of 6% while audio also increased by 8%. 2018 also saw a boost in international revenues, up by 36% to £1.8m, with “exceptional growth” reported in the US and Germany.

C.e.o. Jamie Byng said: “I am delighted that after a year of transition and restructuring, 2018 was such a rewarding year for Canongate, its many superb authors and its extremely hard-working and talented staff. 

“2018 was a year which saw record-breaking backlist sales, record numbers of bestselling frontlist titles, including our first Nielsen number one bestseller, unprecedentedly high export sales and the successful integration of a new business into Canongate’s operations. It was also a healthily profitable year for the business while publishing books of consistently outstanding quality. And we remain very appreciative of all the booksellers, readers, international co-publishers and agents who support the work we do.”

The group paid authors and their agents £3.7m, which represented 31% of the group’s combined turnover.

Severn House, in its first full year of trading since being acquired by Canongate, saw turnover of £2.6m and pre-tax profit of £657,000, the company said.

The firm also said Letters Live, the events company Canongate owns and runs with Benedict Cumberbatch’s production firm SunnyMarch and author Shaun Usher, continued to grow and deliver sold-out live shows.