News & Trends : Book Sales Forecast to Grow (Slightly)

The new "Book Industry Trends 2009" report suggests "flat is the new up," but moderate growth is on the horizon for the next two years.

The “Trends” report queries more than 70,000 publishers by e-mail, and only about 500 companies responded with data and projections this year. Cader argues that “Trends” arrives at its numbers via “the magic of multiplication (and fancy statistical methods to align and ‘triangulate’ the new information versus the previous, also unproven, numbers), a fraction of real information turns into billions of dollars of revenue.”

Healy’s response to such criticism: “Statistical sampling of the kind we used in the preparation of ‘Trends 2009’ … is a valid approach in our view, and it’s difficult to see what other practicable approaches there are in a market of so many companies,” he says. “However, it’s important to stress that our surveys were supplemented and stress-tested by other tools, including interviews with key executives and reviews of other independent data sources. At BISG, we continue to look at ways to improve the accuracy and authority of ‘Trends,’ which we believe remains the most reliable source of the size of our complex and fast-changing industry.”