{"id":10096,"date":"2024-08-07T14:21:12","date_gmt":"2024-08-07T12:21:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/?p=10096"},"modified":"2025-09-07T00:53:50","modified_gmt":"2025-09-06T22:53:50","slug":"die-entwicklung-des-deutschen-buchmarkts-und-wieso-er-vor-massiven-herausforderungen-steht","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/2024\/08\/the-development-of-the-german-book-market-and-why-it-is-facing-massive-challenges\/","title":{"rendered":"The development of the German book market and why it is facing massive challenges"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n

At the beginning of July, the B\u00f6rsenverein published the economic figures for the German book market 2023<\/a>. I also read a few interesting pieces on the topic and involuntarily asked myself where all this is heading and what it means for book culture in this country. Some numbers are quite alarming, others inspire hope. Here I want to share my thoughts and observations on the subject and explain the impressions I have purely from a heavy reader\u2019s perspective.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The B\u00f6rsenverein\u2019s presentation<\/a> on the development of the book market in 2023 and 2024 reads very positively. A sales increase of 2.8% compared to the previous year\u2014the best result since 2010. A particular driver of growth is fiction, which, with growth of 7.7%, accounts for a significantly higher share of sales than in the previous year. Among readers up to 19 years old, there is an increase of 32%. A major share of this plus comes from the young and new adult segments; business is booming here, and it\u2019s fair to say that female readers are supporting the market. The number of first editions is 60,230 books, which can be seen as a healthy development; in the past there were more than 80,000 new releases per year, which is frankly excessive. Publishers seem to be concentrating on fewer titles and pushing marketing more deliberately. So, everything\u2019s great, everything is going super\u2014and considering the strained economic environment with strong inflation in recent years, the hollowing out of city centers, and the general reluctance of consumers who are steadily losing purchasing power\u2014those are indeed pretty good numbers.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

So is everything really fine? From my point of view, a clear no. In light of these billion-euro sales, it would be wrong to herald the end of civilization, but there are plenty of figures that really shocked me. First, the number of book buyers: within the last ten years it has fallen from 36 million to just 25 million. The book market has lost 11 million people who bought books ten years ago and now no longer do. I find that simply staggering. How does that square with high sales? Quite clearly: massive price increases during the inflationary years show up nominally here. This means almost a third of the customers have been lost and the remaining crowd is paying significantly more. Is that a success story? Is that positive? Okay, the book market is very large, but the trend is still alarming.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The second alarming figure is the decline in unit sales, which fell by 1.6% in the first half of 2024 compared to the previous year, and by 1.9% year over year. The strong increase in fiction volumes gets a lot of airtime, but you won\u2019t find anywhere how overall book sales in 2023 decreased nominally. Looking at the last ten years, unit sales must have dropped considerably, because a third of former book buyers aren\u2019t buying anymore. Unfortunately, it\u2019s also impossible to find out how the individual fiction genres have changed. The editors at Literaturcafe tried to obtain those figures<\/a>, but had no success. However, the following information could be obtained from Media Control:<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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They won\u2019t name the concrete number either, but the Young Adult<\/em> segment from January to May 2024 shows an increase of 25.5% compared to the same period of the previous year. In the New Adult<\/em> segment, the increase in the same period is a staggering 243.7%!<\/p>\r\nLiteraturcafe.de<\/cite><\/blockquote>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Young and New Adult are therefore the new cash cows of the book world, to the point that even genre-foreign publishers like GU are considering entering the segment. The question is whether this is a sustainable trend. Why are significantly more consumers opting for easily digestible reads? I\u2019d venture that it\u2019s not only teenage readers embracing this genre. Is it a decline in intellectual capacity? An infantilization of society? Because everyone is working so hard that in the evening they collapse on the sofa and, out of sheer exhaustion, can only consume light content\u2014if they pick up a book at all? Because social media consumption has lowered the attention span below that of a goldfish (a dubious study that, as far as I know, has been debunked)? Or are these actually all young readers\u2014there is, after all, hefty growth there? I won\u2019t speculate, but it leaves many questions open for me.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Another interesting result is that roughly a third of younger readers discover their books via social media. In an Arte segment<\/a>, they even go so far as to compare TikTok BookTokers to the great literary salons of the 19th century. I took a closer look at TikTok some time ago and have to say the comparison is simply ridiculous. Given the decline in readership, though, we can be grateful for every book that\u2019s read\u2014no matter what it is and how it\u2019s discovered.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Marius from Buch-Haltung also wrote some time ago about the withering of the literary debate<\/a>. And I have to agree: the decline in readership is reflected not only in the economic data. Whether it\u2019s literature programs on public broadcasters, review space in newspapers, or literary discussion online, there is a clear downturn in debate about literature. Looking at the number of book blogs on the Top List on Lesestunden<\/a>, there were almost 1,400 blogs at the peak in 2020. In 2022, there were at least just under 1,000. Now, in 2024, we\u2019re at just under 750 book blogs. Since its peak, the number of German-language book blogs has therefore halved.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

And let\u2019s not kid ourselves: there\u2019s no reason to hope for improvement here. In economic terms, shocks keep occurring that mirror this development. Think of headlines like the insolvency of Weltbild or the insolvency of the book wholesaler KNV (which, as far as I gathered, was narrowly rescued). The market is changing\u2014that\u2019s normal; consolidation is often good and right. But in which direction? I\u2019m convinced that the book market will lose substantially in quality over the next few years. Germany is in a sustainably inflationary environment in which, due to the ongoing significant dismantling of the economy, purchasing power and prosperity will be destroyed for years to come. We\u2019re already seeing consumers saving in every area. Obviously, when money goes to utilities and groceries, every expense is weighed carefully. Production costs for books<\/a> have risen significantly and will at best stabilize at a very high level. One can cheer the sales increase, but after years with astronomical inflation rates of 10%, publishers end up with a hefty real decline\u2014you don\u2019t need to be an industry insider to read that between the lines. Since 2019, book prices have risen by 10.9%, and for children\u2019s and young adult books even by 14.2%. In 2023 alone, books became 4.9% more expensive. By a simple calculation, sales would already have to exceed \u20ac10.7 billion to show even minimal real growth. In reality, the market has been shrinking for years. According to a study commissioned by the federal government<\/a>, the 40 largest of 2,000 publishers generate around 80% of sales. Printing accounts for 31% of costs, personnel for 18%\u2014both heavily affected by high inflation. Rising production costs alone will make many small publishers\u2019 businesses unprofitable. Not a good outlook for literary diversity, especially with a shrinking readership.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The economic outlook is one side; the cultural outlook is the other. I found one result in the B\u00f6rsenverein\u2019s economic report shocking: how children and adolescents came to reading. Significantly fewer 10\u201315-year-olds now say they were introduced to books by parents reading aloud. That\u2019s 13.6% fewer than among today\u2019s 20\u201329-year-old readers. By contrast, the role of schools in introducing young readers has increased markedly. I take this to mean that family reading and reading with parents is clearly declining. Parents no longer model book consumption to the same extent as ten years ago. Schools have to compensate\u2014an institution that in Germany has already lost substantial capacity due to a shortage of skilled staff, and will lose more. It\u2019s even more extreme at schools with a high proportion of students with a migration background, where limited language skills make shared reading even more difficult, or where the family background makes a path to literature highly unlikely. And that proportion has been steadily increasing for years. In addition, it seems that people aged 20\u201349 are turning away from reading, while readers over fifty remain loyal<\/a>. Is demographic change slowly squeezing out reading as well?<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

I know I\u2019ll be criticized for sounding negative about the excessive consumption of young and new adult books\u2014or for speculating that intellectual capacity is declining. But the indications are growing that increased media consumption, intensive social media use, and heavy internet use are leaving their mark. A small German publisher, for instance, wants to simplify classics with the help of artificial intelligence and republish them<\/a>. In this month\u2019s issue of c\u2019t there\u2019s an article reporting on a study that examined the complexity of pop songs and demonstrated that, since 1950, they\u2019ve been getting simpler.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

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“With simple melodies and rhythms, songwriters try to avoid overwhelming their listeners. On the other hand, it may be that music is adapting to a general trend of the digital age. To share information with a limited number of characters, language has to be increasingly shortened. That reduces complexity and can lead to listeners no longer being able to process complex content.”<\/p>\r\nc’t issue 17\/2024<\/cite><\/blockquote>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

I won\u2019t even go into the fact that streaming services have become established over the last ten years and reached a broad audience. That this eats up a lot of consumption time is no secret\u2014anyone who has spent an evening with Netflix, binging one episode after another, can confirm it. You can interpret these bits of information however you like. But none of it argues for a boom\u2014or even modest growth\u2014in the book market. I might be wrong; I hope I\u2019m wrong (I\u2019m usually wrong with my forecasts), but the odds don\u2019t seem to be in favor this time. If there were an ETF for the German book market, I certainly wouldn\u2019t invest in it.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

At least when it comes to new editions of classics, I don\u2019t have the feeling there are fewer. It remains unchanged at a very low level. Thanks to Nikol Verlag, which reissues many classics in handsome editions. But Hanser and Mare also repeatedly publish very high-quality and even newly translated classics. These are still little islands where I find refuge on many evenings\u2014and I hope they won\u2019t stop publishing these books.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The book market won\u2019t collapse, that\u2019s clear; it will remain a stable billion-euro market in the future. But I see it similarly to the relationship between a country\u2019s educational level and its prosperity (and economic performance). If people read less, society pays a price. And that price is high\u2014not only in euros, but also culturally. There is certainly no reason to cheer in light of these figures. As in many other areas of life, politics and society will also fail here in this country. And no one can claim the warning signs weren\u2019t clear\u2014even when wrapped in a \u201cpositive overall balance\u201d from an industry association that likely expected far worse numbers. I can\u2019t explain the optimism otherwise. The whole industry must ask itself how it intends to earn money in the future and where further growth is supposed to come from. Or it accepts that the book market is shrinking\u2014which it has been for years. That wouldn\u2019t be unusual for how business is done here, and it wouldn\u2019t surprise me in this sector either.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

What do you think? Is the book market going completely down the drain? Or is everything great? Do you see a trend reversal? Is there something that will give books a real push again? Or am I exaggerating and it\u2019s not that bad after all? Or did I misunderstand something? Was everything better in the past? Feel free to share your opinion\u2014and feel free to bash what I\u2019ve written here. A little rant has livened up many a discussion ;)<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At the beginning of July, the B\u00f6rsenverein published the economic figures for the German book market 2023. I also read a few interesting pieces on the topic and involuntarily asked myself where all this is heading and what it means for book culture in this country. Some numbers are quite alarming, others inspire hope. Here … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “The development of the German book market and why it is facing massive challenges”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7214,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"slim_seo":{"title":"Die Entwicklung des deutschen Buchmarkts und wieso er vor massiven Herausforderungen steht - lesestunden","description":"Anfang Juli hat der B\u00f6rsenverein die Wirtschaftszahlen zum Buchmarkt 2023 in Deutschland ver\u00f6ffentlich. Zudem habe ich zu dem Thema ein paar interessante Beitr\u00e4"},"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10096","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-book-market-publishers"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/schummelnde_verlage_beitrag.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10096","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10096"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10096\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10096"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10096"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lesestunden.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10096"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}