LATEST NEWS...

2010/11 BMS Membership now open

Newly restructured membership packages, including the introduction of a level tariff to encourage multiple memberships within companies, and a newly formed committee, have been announced as part of the 2010 drive for Book Marketing Society memberships.

Visit the BMS website here for more information

The GB consumer market had struggled in 2009, dropping 5% in value over 2008 to £2.2bn; however, the drop in volume had not been so great, with the number of books purchased by consumers in 2009 down by only 1% to 330m units.

The trend over a longer period has been similar, with the market dropping 11% in value, and 4% in volume, since 2007.

Isolating the performance of independent retailers however shows a contrasting performance to the market as a whole.  In 2009, this sector experienced a 4% drop in volume terms over 2008, but a 1% increase in value terms over the previous 12 months. 

Analysis of Books & Consumers data reveals that one-third of the market in volume terms is accounted for by purchases of books from smaller publishers (in both 2008 and 2009), although they accounted for 37% in value terms in 2009 (up from 35% in 2008).

The match between the two independent sectors is clear:  over half – 57% – of volume purchases in independent retailers are of books from smaller publishers, an increase of 1 percentage point on 2008.

In the market as a whole, two out of the three main categories (adult fiction and adult non-fiction) suffered a decline in volume and value in 2009 over the previous year, with only the children’s sector growing.  In contrast, the independent bookshop sector has seen volume and value growth in both the adult categories, but a decline in children’s book sales; a pattern reflected in the sales of small publisher titles too.

Whilst adult non-fiction accounts for just over half of the value of all purchases by British consumers, this category accounted for over 70% of the value of purchases from both independent retailers and smaller publishers in 2009. 

Adult non-fiction is the most important category for independent booksellers; in 2009, they accounted for 13% of all purchases in the adult non-fiction category by volume, up 1 percentage point from 2008 (compared to an overall market share of 9%).  Independent retailers have, however, seen a significant drop in their share of sales of children’s non-fiction, down from 10% by volume in 2008 to 5% in 2009.  Whilst small publishers are also very important to the adult non-fiction category, with their titles accounting for 47% of all purchases in this category, compared to an overall market share of 33%, they are also extremely important to the children’s non-fiction market, accounting for over half – 53% - of all purchases in this category.

So, whilst independent booksellers are doing a good job selling the adult non-fiction that small publishers are so expert at producing, they are not such a productive channel for the children’s non-fiction coming from smaller publishers, and one reason for this is the changing demographics of those choosing to use independent booksellers.

Males aged 55-79 were the most important customers for independent retailers in 2006, accounting for 13% of all purchases through this channel.  By 2009, middle aged and older men (35-79) were even more likely to be the audience for books bought through independent retailers, with the share of books bought by females aged 12-54 taken by indie booksellers dropping significantly, from 7% to around 4%.

Whilst the customer profile for smaller publishers’ books is much less polarised, men still account for proportionately larger shares – and there was also a noticeable drop among female purchasers of their books between 2006 and 2009, although not as dramatic as the fall experienced by independent booksellers.

All data Books & Consumers ©BML/TNS 2010

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Spotlight on the e-book consumer in the UK and US

Initial figures from BML’s Books & Consumers panel suggest that early adopters of paid for book downloads in Britain are typically younger males, who are relatively light buyers of printed books. 

The findings from a survey of over 500 members of the Books & Consumers panel were revealed at a seminar at the London Book Fair on April 12th, in which BML compared its data on UK consumers with equivalent US figures from its parent company, Bowker Publishing Services.

In the US, where e-books account for a higher share of consumer book purchases than in the UK (although still less than 3% of the market), the profile of e-book buyers in 2009 was closer to that of printed book buyers, with a more even split between males and females than in Britain, and a wider spread of age groups (see Table).

The seminar also looked at the potential impact of growth in the e-book market on book categories and channels, with data from a BML survey using its BookZone panel showing that the vast majority of UK book lovers expected to download books via the internet rather than going to a shop to buy them.  In the US, Bowker, had found that this shift had also affected sources of printed books, with 44% of e-book buyers’ physical book purchases bought online, compared to 20% of book purchases overall.

For further information on BML’s Books & Consumers and BookZone research tools, contact Steve Bohme (steve@bookmarketing.co.uk, tel: 020 7832 17874).  For information on US book/e-book consumers, contact Kelly Gallagher at Bowker Publishing Services (kelly.gallagher@bowker.com).

 

 

 

 

Sources: Books & Consumers © BML/Kantar Worldpanel 2010 (Base: 534 GB e-book buyers); Bowker PubTrack Consumer © 2010 (Base: c.1300 US e-book buyers)

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BML launch ‘Understanding the Digital Book Consumer’ research

BML is to undertake a comprehensive research study on behalf of the book industry, to monitor changes in the characteristics and habits of current and potential digital book consumers, and examine the barriers and triggers which will affect engagement in the digital book market, attitudes towards key issues such as pricing and DRM, and the impact of downloading on purchasing of printed books.

BML plans to use both qualitative and quantitative techniques to supplement the ongoing measurement of the e-book market via BML’s Books & Consumers survey (which will record the who, what, where, when and why of purchasing of the new format), and will tap into the equivalent work being carried out in the US by Bowker.

Book industry companies and organisations can help determine the coverage of the Understanding the Digital Book Consumer study, and have full access to the results, by becoming full subscribers to the research.  Partial subscriptions are available for those requiring summary results.

For a copy of the full proposals for the research, including proposed timings and costs, contact Jo Henry at jo@bookmarketing.co.uk, tel: 020 7832 1782.

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20 years of Books & Consumers

Crime fiction and biographies have been the main genre share winners in the consumer book market over the last 13 years, with gains also for children’s books, food/drink, humour and history.  Over the same period, supermarkets and the internet have increased their share of books bought by consumers from 6% to nearly a third of all books bought. 

These were just a few of the findings reported at the latest meeting of the Galley Club – the long established publishing social group – where BML’s Research Director, Steve Bohme, looked back at the 20 years that BML’s Books & Consumers survey has been running.

This long term analysis also revealed that in 1989, book & stationery stores such as WHSmith were the most widely used source of books among British consumers, whereas in 2009 these had been overtaken by bookshops selling all or mainly books, such as Waterstone’s and independent bookshops.  Meanwhile, the proportion of people buying books from supermarkets had trebled over the 20 year period, with one in five Britons aged 12-79 buying books from Asda, Tesco, etc. in 2009 (see chart).

The methodology used by the survey has changed radically, of course, over this period, so that direct comparisons between the data need to be treated with caution.  The 1989 survey involved c1700 face-to-face interviews with a representative sample of adults, who were asked to recall their behaviour over the last 12 months.  Books & Consumers now uses a representative panel of 15000 12-79s who record details of their new book purchases throughout the year, mainly using online data capture.

For more trends in consumer book purchases, contact Steve Bohme at
steve@bookmarketing.co.uk, tel: 020 7832 1784.

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Books & Consumers Conference Report

Attendance was high at the recent Annual BML Conference at One Birdcage Walk, where Kelly Gallagher, Vice-President, Publisher Services, PubTrack, Bowker, described the 4% drop in spending on books between 2005 and 2009 as “pretty admirable in a recession”. Sales by volume were, however, up by 10% over the same period.

As ever the conference featured a wealth of information. Steve Bohme, BML’s Research Director, revealed data from the Books & Consumers survey showing that the
drop in the number of books bought in 2009 compared to 2007 and 2008 reflects a decrease in the proportion of consumers buying books, rather than a decrease in the average number of books per buyer, with the market increasingly reliant on a smaller pool of committed buyers.

Older consumers (aged 55-79) drove growth in book purchases between 2005 and 2007, and were the most consistent group in terms of book buying between 2007 and 2009, both for self and others.

Purchases of children’s books – whoever bought for – have driven volume growth in the market in the longer term, with a 26% increase between 2005 and 2009.  Adult books have also increased by volume over this period, albeit by just 4%. 

Leading genres declining between 2005 and 2009 included popular fiction, literary fiction, romance, SF, travel, family/health, entertainment and children’s educational books.

Supermarkets, the internet and bargain bookshops have driven volume growth in book purchases between 2005 and 2009, and seen double digit increases in spending over the same period.  Independents have also seen small increases by both measures, contrasting with a small decrease for chain bookshops, and a significant decline in purchasing from other shops and direct mail. Bargain bookshops were the only main channel to see both volume and value increases in 2009.  

Two thirds of books bought in 2009 were either bought at perceived discount or for under £5.  However, only 9% of these purchases were primarily prompted by the price or offer (although price may, of course, still have contributed to the purchase decision).

The most common prompts to purchase books in 2009 were seeing the book while browsing, previous readership of the author or series and subject matter.  One in ten overall (but 15% of children’s books) were bought in response to gift requests, while 7% were prompted by a review or recommendation.

For more detailed analysis and insight from the Books & Consumer survey contact Research Director Steve Bohme, steve@bookmarketing.co.uk

The first issue looked at the book buying habits of the 3.8m working mums, who were responsible for 10% of books bought in the last year, and have seen their purchases increase over the last 3 years. Subscribers will receive approximately 6 reports per year and each one will profile a different demographic group including, for example, teenage boys, mothers at home, fathers, younger men: no kids, retired men, upmarket males and downmarket females.

For more information about a subscription to Books & Consumers, contact BML on 0207 832 1784.

BML conducted a survey for Lovereading.co.uk to examine how reading choices are made, how people find information about the latest books, the reasons for buying online, and awareness and experience of ebooks & downloading.

The survey of just over 1300 Lovereading.co.uk members revealed that:

• For these heavy book buying respondents, author familiarity had the most widespread influence (90%) on reading choice, with series familiarity also a strong influence (63%).
• Recommendations from family and friends (66%) and from newspapers/magazines (59%) were also important influences, while extracts were considered more useful than website recommendations and reviews (53% vs. 43%).
• Blurbs influenced the reading choices of 62% of respondents.
• Cover design was the least influential factor examined (27%).
• Most respondents were aware that you could download a book, but had not actually done so (65%), while 19% claimed to have downloaded a book. Of these, the majority (53%) read their downloads on a laptop or computer rather than a dedicated e-book device (22%), iPhone (7%) or other mobile (3%).
• When it comes to paying for book downloads bought via the internet, most expected to sometimes pay and sometimes get them for free, while more expected to always pay if downloading in a bookshop.
• When asked what they expect to pay for ebooks, most of the respondents (c85%) thought that a downloaded book should cost less than a physical book, regardless of whether it was bought online or in a bookshop.

Take advantage of BML's questionnaire design and analysis expertise to survey your customers, email contacts and website users. Contact us on 0207 832 1784 or email steve@bookmarketing.co.uk for further information and prices.

Books & Consumers subscribers can now discover more about their book buyers by adding to their subscription access to additional lifestyle variables.

Variables available are:

•           Newspapers & magazines read

•           Number of books read in a month

•           Attendance at reading groups

•           Attitudes to reading

•           Source of new book information

•           Activities while commuting

•           General shopping attitudes

Contact steve@bookmarketing.co.uk for further information and prices.

A "special relationship"?

US & GB consumer book markets compared

• 57% of British consumers purchased one or more books last year, compared to only 50% of Americans;
• Mystery and Romance books accounted for a whopping 57% of all fiction books purchased by Americans last year, versus just 31% in Britain;
• Men were less important to the adult fiction market in the U.S. (29% of purchases) than in Britain (40%) in 2008;
• While the leading GB channel continues to be retail bookstore chains (34%), the internet is now the #1 channel for books in the U.S.

BML has teamed up with the US information and business intelligence agency RR Bowker to publish a new report comparing consumer book buying habits on either side of the Atlantic.

The report entitled A Special Relationship? A Comparison of Consumer Book Buying Habits & Trends in the United States & Great Britain, brings together data from Bowker’s PubTrack Consumer survey in the US, and BML’s Books & Consumers survey in the UK. It explores:

• Growth in the consumer book markets in the US and Britain
• The popularity of different genres of books among US and British consumers
• Trends in formats purchased, including the share of US purchases taken by ebooks
• The key book buying demographics in the two populations
• The relative importance of bookshops, the internet, supermarkets and direct mail
• Purchase motivations and reasons in each location.

The report was published in October 2009, in pdf format, priced at £150+VAT for the UK book trade. 50% discount for BML clients. For further information, contact Steve Bohme on 0207 832 1784 or email.

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