Industry Statistics: Looking Behind the Numbers
Jordan notes that audio book sales are separately reported in AAP monthly and annual data. According to those reports, book publishers’ audio sales for 2005 were $206.3 million. For the entire audio book industry, the APA reports $871 million for 2005.
However, audio books are not reported in the “Trends” report. Healy may be forecasting possible enhancements to the BISG reports when he confirms that anyone interested in projecting the industry’s economic health has to consider the digital medium—not just e-books, but downloadable audio and CDs.
- Companies:
- Amazon.com
- American Booksellers Association
- Association of American Publishers
- Book Publishing Report
- Bowker
- Consortium
- Evangelical Christian Publishers Association
- Fordham University
- Independent Publishers Group
- National Association of College Stores
- National Book Network (NBN)
- Nielsen Media Research
- PMA
- Publishers Weekly
- Simba Information
- The Book Industry Study Group
- Places:
- Manhattan
- United States
Eugene G. Schwartz is editor at large for ForeWord Reviews, an industry observer and an occasional columnist for Book Business magazine. In an earlier career, he was in the printing business and held production management positions at Random House, Prentice-Hall/Goodyear and CRM Books/Psychology Today. A former PMA (IBPA) board member, he has headed his own publishing consultancy, Consortium House. He is also Co-Founder of Worthy Shorts Inc., a development stage online private press and publication service for professionals as well as an online back office publication service for publishers and associations. He is on the Publishing Business Conference and Expo Advisory Board.