From Publishers Weekly:
Although total revenue of the world’s 50 largest book publishers topped $50 billion in 2016, last year was not an easy one for global publishing giants. Less than half of the top 50 publishers posted revenue gains in 2016, with the balance reporting sales declines. One of the companies that had the toughest year was Pearson, which had a 15% decline in sales, to $5.62 billion. Even with the drop in revenue, Pearson continued its longtime reign as the world’s largest book publisher, according to the Livres Hebdo/Publishers Weekly annual ranking.
. . . .
Sales in the educational market, particularly in the U.S., were down in 2016 compared to 2015, and the downturn meant declining sales for publishers and also led some companies to restructure. Pearson underwent a companywide reorganization in 2016 that it said was in response to changes in the educational publishing market. The move eliminated about 4,000 employees. Earlier this year, the educational publisher said it intended to cut about 3,000 more positions. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, which was the 14th-largest publisher in 2016 but saw a 3% decline in revenue, announced this spring that it will eliminate between 8% and 10% of its workforce of 4,500 in 2017.
. . . .
Bertelsmann’s 7% decline in 2016 revenue was due entirely to a drop in sales at Penguin Random House. The lack of a big new bestseller hurt results at the company, and it divested some smaller divisions in the year. The decline at PRH was offset in part by a sales increase in Bertelsmann’s education division.
Link to the rest at Publishers Weekly
and
So, if J.K. Rowling stops producing content, two publishers that showed a modest increase in revenue (one after playing with the numbers) are also showing declining sales. How can you have a successful business based on that strategy?
HP #1 is currently number 15 on amazon charts most *sold* list, even after all the time since publication. Scholastic should give the little girl who told her daddy to buy the book a free college scholarship.
ETA: as is usually the case, *all 7* of the books are on charts most read list.
This PW post didn’t enthrall me quite like either their “The World’s 108 Largest Publishers, 2016” or their riveting page-turner, “The World’s 749 Largest Publishers, 2015.”
Sounds like a trend… 🙂
Next year should be 25, projecting the function out by a year. 🙂
I find it interesting that they focus so hard on revenue because revenue alone can be so misleading. What really counts is profit and it doesn’t necessarily follow that having high revenues means you have high profits.
What about Amazon Publishing? Are they really not big enough to warrant being listed in a Top 50 list? I have a hard time believing that.
You would be correct.
Based on 2016 sales of ~$500M (via Author Earnings, DBW charts) they would rate no lower than 29. If they’ve shown decent growth for 2017, they might rank as high as 25th.
Any list of publishers that ignores the world’s biggest publisher — one of the few publishers with a presence in more than ten of the thirteen distinct publishing “industries” — is more than a bit suspect.
But the United States Government Printing Office doesn’t count because its revenues are noncomparable, right? And then there’s Her Majesty’s Stationery Office and other equivalents, many of which publish works that would otherwise be high-value commercial products — I still have and treasure my 1987 Ordnance Survey atlas.
And then one digs into the purported “analysis”… oh my.