Record Ebook Sales Recorded in First Quarter of 2004

Posted on June 4, 2004

The Open eBook Forum (OeBF) reported a new quarterly record for ebook retail sales. Ebook units sold for the first quarter 2004 were up 46% and ebook revenues were up 28% over the same quarter in 2003. The statistical reports released by the OeBF represent aggregate statistics submitted by reporting companies and does not represent the entire ebook publishing and retail industries.

The report also found that a total of 421,955 ebooks were sold in Q1 2004 alone, a 46% increase over the same period in 2003, during which time 288,440 units were sold. $3,233,220 in sales were logged by retailers in Q1 2004, a 28% increase over the same period in 2003 during which time retailers reported $2,516,469 on sales of ebooks.

"This quarter eBooks have hit a new high mark for sales," said Open eBook Forum President Steve Potash. "eBooks represent the fastest growing segment of the publishing industry."

The OeBF's eBook Bestseller list for May was also released with Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code topping the list for the third straight month. Kevin Ryan's Van Helsing, Dan Brown's Angels & Demons, The Da Vinci Code: Fact or Fiction and Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason's The Rule of Four rounded out the top 5 eBooks on the list.

"In addition to terrific sales and traffic growth to our web store, we are also seeing fast growth in new audience segments, especially to women customers," said Mike Violano, Vice President and General Manager of eReader.com.

Publishers and retailers that contributed to the 1st quarter 2004 survey are: eBooks.com, Elib, E-Reads, Ltd, Fictionwise.com, Inc., Franklin Electronic Publishers, Hard Shell Word Factory, HarperCollines, Holzbrinck Publishers, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Laridian, Love Kush Publications, Mobipocket, Mushroom eBooks, Numilog, OverDrive, Inc., Palm Digital Media, powells.com, RAND Corporation, Random House, Inc., Simon & Schuster, The McGraw-Hill Companies, Time Warner Book Group, WORDsearch and Zondervan.



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