R.R. Bowker Releases U.S. Book Production Statistics
Posted on May 9, 2002
R.R. Bowker, a provider of bibliographic information in North America, has released statistics regarding U.S. book production from its Books In Print database. Books In Print is a bibliographic database listing over millions of audio, video, in-print, forthcoming and out-of-print titles. The most notable finding from the report is that total book production, led by a huge increase in the output of adult fiction titles, will likely reach an all-time high of more than 135,000 in 2001, an increase of more than 10 percent over 2000. This data is interesting because estimates from the Association of American Publishers (AAP) found that book sales were flat for 2001. The AAP reported that US book sales totaled $25,356,500,000 billion in 2001, a meager 0.1 percent increase over 2000.
The growth in overall book production in 2001 was fueled by the adult fiction category. Adult fiction continued its record growth of recent years, increasing by a staggering 20% over 2000. The jump in adult fiction titles last year comes on the heels of an equally impressive increase of 18% in 2000.
"While the record title output for 2001 does not necessarily signal a crisis of overproduction in the publishing industry, recent estimates of flat book sales by the Association of American Publishers (AAP), suggests that there may be a market disconnect between what is published, and what is ultimately sold. It would be both interesting and useful to further analyze the correlation between annual book production and net dollar sales," said Andrew Grabois, senior director of publisher relations and content development for New Providence, N.J.-based R.R. Bowker. "Taking the long view, book production in 2001 was the continuation of a phenomenal 20-year run for publishers. Since 1980, almost 2 million books were published in the U.S., more than the 1.3 million books published in the preceding 100 years."
Other interesting findings in Bowker's report include the following:
- Book production in the U.S. is the highest in the world, surpassing that of Great Britain, which had been the recognized leader in international title output. In the U.S., a new book in published nearly every four seconds.
- On a per capita basis, U.S. book production is actually relatively low compared to other industrialized, English-speaking nations. Most recent census and production statistics show that the U.S. produced a book for every 2,336 people, a distant fifth behind the U.K. (545), Canada (577), New Zealand (779) and Australia (2,041).
- In 2001, the top three production categories were Adult Fiction, Sociology/Economics, and Juvenile. Together, these categories accounted for 1 in every 3 books published in the U.S.
- In other adult categories, production in the Music category increased by more than 1,100 titles, and Religion followed its 2.6% jump in 2000 with an increase of 2.7% in 2001.
- After dropping by 8 percent in 2000, juvenile output rebounded strongly in 2001 and will once again reach the 9,000+ levels maintained by this category since the early 1990s.