Holiday Jitters
Kathleen Bolton on Nov 17 2008 | Filed under: Business
Don’t we run a story on booksellers’ gloomy forecasts every holiday season? Only this time, their pessimism might be justified:
Like many businesses across the retail sector, the publishing industry has been hit by a raft of doom and gloom in the past few weeks. Leonard S. Riggio, chairman and largest shareholder of Barnes & Noble, said in an internal memorandum predicting a dreadful holiday shopping season, as first reported in The Wall Street Journal last week, that “never in all my years as a bookseller have I seen a retail climate as poor as the one we are in.”
Last week HarperCollins, the books division of the News Corporation, reported that fiscal first-quarter operating income had slid to $3 million from $36 million a year earlier, despite its publication of the Oprah Winfrey-anointed novel “The Story of Edgar Sawtelle” by David Wroblewski. A week earlier Doubleday Publishing Group, a unit of Random House, laid off 16 people, a 10 percent cut in staff. At the time the company said the move did not presage further layoffs in other publishing divisions, but industry insiders said they would not be surprised to see more.
Also this month Rodale, the magazine and book publisher, laid off 14 people in its book division, a little more than 7 percent of the staff.
Hoo boy. Despite all the squeeing we’ve done around WU in the last few months, all the bad news does give pause. How is the downturn in the economy going to affect book-buying? Will people use the library more? Undoubtedly. Will people buy books instead of more expensive gifts like electronics and jewelry? Hopefully.
From the NYT’s article:
“A book is still this incredibly lovely, respectable gift,” said Jamie Raab, publisher of Grand Central Publishing, and is “a lot cheaper than the other luxury items that people tend to buy at Christmas.”
“So we could get lucky and see that it really works in our favor,” she added.
I have a feeling that spring 2009 will be an incredibly difficult period for the publishing industry. Orders are being cut, and I have no doubt that advances and new sales will be pared down as well.
In our household, books, wine and chocolate are still gifts du jour no matter the economic climate.
Are you planning on cutting back your book-buying this holiday? Or will you increase it? How is the downturn affecting your book addiction?
Image by Ameera.
Kathleen Bolton
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A year ago, I went to Borders at the Time Warner Center in NYC and walked back out — the line to pay was way too long. Borders had sent out these coupons over the holiday buying period and everyone had them clutched in their hands. I believe people who tend to buy books – for others and for themselves – will continue to buy them, and the coupons are a nice way to “thank” that addiction, maybe even encourage onr or two extra purchases. To me, book buyers are a unique and fairly solid bunch and the guy at Grand Central Publishing has a good point. My main issue with buying books from a bookstroe, is that there are almsot too many to chose from with no distinguishing marketing or marks. All those covers, stacked mile high on the tables when you walk in — and I love books but I find it overwhelming to browse the store sometimes. Anyway, I think a bigger deterrant than cost sometimes is the difficulty in choosing a book, especially one that’s right as a gift for someone else.
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Actually, I always include hardcover books in the old stocking. Yes, they are affordable, and my people seem to really appreciate them. And if I don’t have a title in mind for the gift, my boys love their B&N and Borders gift cards. Just got an email this morning from Borders that they are having their biggest fiction sale ever. Basically, buy one, get one 1/2 off. But I for one have done a major scale back on the holiday gifts. But not on my basic book buying (me bad)!!
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Book buying will always be top priority for me! I learn to sacrifice other things (going out to dinner, etc.) to leave room for books. However, I have discovered the wonderful world of Amazon.com et al and their used books!! I can purchase a “nearly new” copy of something that practically just came out for a fraction of the price, so it works out really well. And the people I give them to as gifts definitely don’t mind the added “character” of a used book!
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I already cut back book buying, but only for myself. When times get tough, I tend to pare down my personal spending as opposed to having to make cuts to my gift budget.
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I already have several books stowed away for gift giving, and I’m sure I’ll buy more. Books are an affordable option when other gifts seem out of range, and they have a long, er, shelf life. ;-)
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Nancydrew, I was at the Barnes & Nobel on 5th Ave. in Aug. and the line was incredible.
I give a lot of gift cards because I might not know the particular taste of the recipent, but I know they like books. Hopefully gift cards will lift sales after the holiday slump.
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I’m still buying books for myself, but not as often. I am going to the library more often. In fact, last night I browsed Barnes & Noble for the latest reads and today I put hold on these books at the library. I’ve just started doing this.
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Companies like Borders (where I work) send out coupons to get people to come into the store and purchase something; consider it a mild incentive to get people to actually go inside at all.
Books aren’t popular just because the vast majority of people don’t read, period. Those that do aren’t always the best consumers, either; we have hordes of chumps that sit on their asses and just read books. If you like it, bloody well buy the damn thing.
The most common place I see this is for the graphic novels/manga, which is why companies like Tokyopop are screwed. Their customers don’t usually buy their stuff; they just read what they want and leave the book behind (while ironically demanding that Tokyopop translate even more).
Stuff like Kindle and Amazon’s sneaky little tactics are just the straws that (will eventually) break the camel’s back.
So yeah, readers (and I emphasize that word) will continue to buy books, insofar as they do already, but most will probably start getting into the used book scene, or just buy online.
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My mother works at Barnes and Noble, and when I called to ask her about that quote, she indignantly told me that the rest of the letter said that B&N was doing fine, and employees could rest in the assurance that there would be no layoffs.
Books tend to do well in bad economic times. I believe they will in these times, too.
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kathleen,
a test then — on dec 18th, i am going back to Borders at Time Warner Ctr; @6pm or so. i will easily be able to tell if the line then has the same fortitude as it did last year… :)
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OK, nancydrew, report back to us with a “field report” :-)
Barbara, I also work for a “large corporation” which assured us there would be no layoffs. But they didn’t say a thing about reducing hours or moving fulltimers to part time. So fingers crossed for all of us.
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I’m buying books! I’m giving books! I’m supporting bookstores, libraries, even Amazon. This holiday season, I’m all about books!
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