OKAY one more chart. Publishers Weekly has more information on the Bookscan bookstore sales numbers, with a breakdown by genre. As we reported last week, Graphic Novels were up, although according to this piece it was only 11%, not the 12% previously reported. Probably a rounding error, or possibly dollars. This chart does give overall sales showing a tad under 12 million units sold in 2016, up from 10.& million in 2015.
Print unit sales fell 1% in adult fiction in 2016, as a number of genres had double-digit declines. While most of the declining areas were those most affected by sales of e-books (such as romance and mystery), unit sales of classics fell 19%. In 2015, the classics genre benefited from the release of Harper Lee’s Go Set a Watchman, which led to a surge in sales of her To Kill a Mockingbird. Offsetting the declines were a 12% unit sales increase general fiction—the largest fiction area—and an 11% gain in graphic novels.
This expanded chart shows that GNs were NOT the only category to go up, though. Horror and religion also had gains, but not as much as graphic novels, so roll out the triumphalism! Boo-ya! Who let the dogs out! We rock! etc etc etc
Despite Children’s GNs getting more BISAC codes, they didn’t break them down on this chart, sadly. Year over year sales in children’s graphic novels are something I much desire to see, so anyone who has Bookscan and knows how to run a report is free to leak that to me whenever they want.
Unit Sales by Category, 2015–2016 (in thousands)
Category | 2015 | 2016 | CHANGE |
---|---|---|---|
Adult Nonfiction | |||
Art/Architecture/Design/Photography | 11,355 | 9,305 | -18% |
Biography/Autobiography/Memoir | 23,422 | 23,133 | -1% |
Business/Economics | 17,168 | 18,047 | 5% |
Cooking/Entertaining | 15,521 | 16,471 | 6% |
Computers | 4,224 | 3,808 | -10% |
Crafts/Hobbies/Antiques/Games | 11,600 | 20,326 | 75% |
Health/Fitness/Medicine/Sports | 21,540 | 21,694 | 1% |
History/Law/Political Science | 17,199 | 17,883 | 4% |
House & Home/Gardening | 3,212 | 2,945 | -8% |
Humor | 4,674 | 4,488 | -4% |
Performing Arts | 8,336 | 9,362 | 12% |
Reference | 33,292 | 34,310 | 3% |
Religion/Bibles | 35,928 | 40,637 | 13% |
Self-Help | 11,365 | 12,865 | 13% |
Travel | 7,620 | 7,585 | -0.5% |
General Nonfiction | 30,034 | 30,729 | 2% |
Total Adult Nonfiction | 258,490 | 273,589 | 7% |
Adult Fiction | |||
Action/Adventure | 2,272 | 1,644 | -28% |
Classics | 10,002 | 8,083 | -19% |
Fantasy | 6,606 | 6,537 | -1% |
Graphic Novels | 10,707 | 11,938 | 11% |
Mystery/Detective | 12,534 | 11,225 | -10% |
Occult/Psychological/Horror | 2,211 | 2,369 | 7% |
Religion | 4,426 | 4,739 | 7% |
Romance | 27,966 | 24,989 | -11% |
Science Fiction | 6,028 | 5,319 | -12% |
Suspense/Thrillers | 21,855 | 21,901 | 0% |
Western | 2,193 | 1,983 | -10% |
General Fiction | 35,192 | 39,492 | 12% |
Total Adult Fiction | 141,993 | 140,221 | -1% |
Juvenile Nonfiction | |||
Animals | 5,145 | 5,732 | 11% |
Biographies/Autobiographies | 4,240 | 4,463 | 5% |
Concepts | 4,294 | 4,268 | -1% |
Education/Reference/Language | 7,637 | 8,948 | 17% |
Games/Activities/Hobbies | 13,749 | 10,849 | -21% |
History/Sports/People/Places | 12,817 | 13,454 | 5% |
Holidays/Festivals/Religion | 4,082 | 4,824 | 18% |
Social Situations/Family/Health | 2,772 | 2,918 | 5% |
Total Juvenile Nonfiction | 54,735 | 55,456 | 1% |
Juvenile Fiction | |||
Animals | 10,128 | 10,296 | 2% |
Classics | 10,174 | 10,258 | 1% |
Concepts | 9,325 | 9,169 | -2% |
History/Sports/People/Places | 13,561 | 13,957 | 3% |
Holidays/Festivals/Religion | 9,458 | 9,974 | 5% |
Science Fiction/Fantasy/Magic | 44,740 | 52,255 | 17% |
Social Situations/Family/Health | 24,904 | 23,221 | -7% |
General Juvenile Fiction | 49,315 | 48,913 | -1% |
Total Juvenile Fiction | 171,605 | 178,043 | 4% |
The new BISAC codes just went into use at the end of 2016.
That said, they could have broken out sales by the ones already in use.
Once again, the 11% increase over 2015 is even more amazing, in that 2015 had a 22% increase over 2014!
Question: Do we have year-end data for the Direct Market? How does it compare with the bookstore market? (Looking at the December YTD data, it’s a small increase.)
(And is there data for libraries?)
Yeah, Comichron just had their year comparison last week, and it looks like 2016 finished a hair in front of 2015, with +0.3% growth.
http://blog.comichron.com/2017/01/2016-comics-shop-orders-beat-2015.html
2012: +15%
2013: +6%
2014: +4%
2015: +7%
2016: +0.3%
Again their figure from 2015 was several million copies lower than what Brian Hibbs found in the Bookscan files. I’m wondering if they’re splitting a lot of titles off into juvenile fiction or something.
Rereading — yeah, it could be all accounted for by the splitting books off into children’s graphic novels mentioned in the article.
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