Are sales from retail bookstores declining?
From a retail standpoint the market has seen sweeping changes in recent years. Although book stores in the U.S. are still bringing in over 10 billion U.S. dollars annually, online retailers such as Amazon are beginning to restrict the ability of large physical retail chains to compete. Bookstore sales have dropped by over six billion U.S. dollars since 2007, and Barnes & Noble, one of the largest booksellers in the United States, has seen consistently declining revenue numbers for the better part of a decade. Online booksellers can offer prices and selection that physical retailers simply can’t match, and sales from retail bookstores depend enormously on the months August and December to account for shortcomings elsewhere.Book consumers and spending
Naturally, the U.S. book industry relies heavily on consumer spending. The average yearly spend on reading among U.S. consumers was over 90 dollars in 2019, and whilst this is not dramatically down from previous years, 2019 marked the first year since 2010 that spending had dipped below 100 dollars. Reading for pleasure is important to U.S. book lovers, but the coronavirus pandemic hit the United States hard in early 2020 and it is likely that the average spend on books for the full year will be lower as consumers prioritize other purchases.Like other sectors, the book industry will continue to struggle as the United States battles the outbreak, but the market is one that is used to responding to change and it will likely be the book market’s resilience and ability to adapt which keeps it afloat during testing times ahead.
