French book sales drop 5.4%

Sales by French book publishers fell 5.4% in 2022, to a total of €2.9 billion (A$4.7b), reports the Bookseller.

The number of books sold fell 7.7% to 448.5 million, according to the French Publishers Association (SNE). However, compared to 2019, the French book market grew last year by 3.1% in value adjusted for inflation, the SNE said.

By category, literature was down 2.7%, comics and manga fell 4.2%, and children’s book sales were down 8.2%, while school textbooks dropped 9%. Art and coffee table book sales grew 14.7%, and the rights market grew 1.3%, with Spanish the leading language for translations from French.

The SNE said ‘publishers are trying to manage their editorial policy better in order to limit the increase in new titles and not saturate the market’, with the number of new titles down 15.3% from 2019.

SNE director Renaud Lefebvre said the sales dip is partly explained by presidential and parliamentary elections held in the first half of 2022, which ‘always have a negative impact on book sales’. Another concern noted is the growing market for second-hand books, which account for one in five books sold in France and could be ‘considerably more’ in 10 years if present trends continue.

Category: International news