David Shelley Deputy Publisher at Little Brown gave a publisher’s view of the current and future marketplace

Three Challenges…

ONE:  Relationship with supermarkets

They wield a lot of power because:
  o can account for 80%+ of sales on some titles
  o opening order maybe for 15,000 books as opposed to Waterstones’ for 1,000
  o they take 14-16 books per fortnight.

However, they:
  o aim to deliver profits to shareholders
  o sell as many as possible from a small space
  o pursue large discounts and marketing spends (publisher pays to be on the shelf)
  o need big sellers, like Marian Keyes, but can take or leave the rest
  o have very little author loyalty – eg. they may take a writer’s first book, helping them into top 10, but not the second so the writer doesn’t make top 100.

It’s a double-edged sword as commercial fiction can do well and careers can be advanced, although financial rewards can be low – e.g. if Asda sells a book for £1, that’s 59p to publisher and 6p to author.

On an optimistic note, it’s still a new initiative so perhaps supermarkets will come to see benefits of loyalty and consistency.

TWO:  Instability of high street chains

Closure of:
  o Borders – and they’ve not seen business go elsewhere
  o Hughes and Hughes in Ireland
  o Many independents

WHS has reported a decline in footfall.  Many migrating to the Web.

High street chains clawing money back by demanding increased marketing spends (£10k for window display PLUS discounted stock) and/or retrospective discounts. 

THREE:  Expanding digital market

  o Rising sales of e-books and e-readers: 8% of US book sales are e-books; on hard cover releases it’s 30%. 1% in UK but by 2012 could be 12-20%
  o Audio downloads are increasing
  o Amazon will soon be largest UK retailer of books.

There are huge, ruthless, corporate monsters out there, e.g. Walmart has larger GDR than the UK.

Whatever develops, it’s important that copyright stays with authors.

The positives:
  o Massive opportunities to reach new readers
  o Hook in younger readers

Going forward…

Need to become smarter with marketing – in high street, media and on-line. 
  o Iphone apps give info on favourite authors and promotions, harness this.
  o Recent initiative – Iceland shop promotion – where customers receive a free book in return for spending £15+.  Had 100,000 voucher redemptions, resulting in massively increased sales on Amazon, for the three featured authors.

Thoughts on romantic fiction trends…

Market is booming; Stephanie Myers is the most successful in twelve months. 

David also highlighted Nicholas Sparks and JR Ward, selling 5-10 times more than three years ago.

Aspirational lifestyle element, e.g. I ‘heart’ New York.  Heroines work in fashion & business. Focus on bright modern lifestyle.  Still the love element but dressed up in quirky, edgy way.  Finding Mr Right is key.

“Romance is as the epicentre of fiction – it’s never been bigger than it is now.”

Written by Jan Sprenger