What’s the truth about the publishing industry?

I’ve written many posts on this blog ranting about the publishing industry (only as it applies to books), saying that they’re losing money and shooting themselves in the foot by using an old business model that doesn’t work anymore. But maybe I’ve been wrong all this time. I never really thought about where those assumptions I was making came from, that is, until I read a blog post on Literary Kicks that places into question the bad reputation the publishing world has earned.

As the LitKicks article points out, many people (like myself) just assume that publishing books isn’t profitable. Well, the numbers start to tell a different story:

You better believe it. It’s funny that many non-industry people assume that book publishing is a depressed or stagnant business. In fact, as recently as several months ago I wrote here on LitKicks that book publishing is generally an unprofitable business, to which my friend and fellow blogger Mary Delli Santi asked "Where did you get that idea?" My assumption was way off, and a simple look at the financial results released by the major media conglomerates sets the record straight.

Of course, maybe publishing literary books isn’t profitable, however, the industry is made up of more than just literary fiction and poetry. The post continues on to give some of the numbers of these different publishing houses, all of which show a pretty healthy profit.

So why do many of us have a false impression about publishing being a money-losing venture? LitKicks offers an interesting view:

Maybe it’s because the competition for bestselling talent can lead to ruinous advances and highly visible (Thirteen Moons) failures. Maybe it’s because the industry is still rocking and reeling from the changes brought about by the discount rates demanded by Amazon, Barnes and Noble and Borders. Maybe it’s also because we read endless articles in newspapers and magazines about the "death of the novel" and various other publishing-world crises.

I guess when all you hear in the media is about sagging book sales and that many Americans don’t even read novels anymore, it’s no wonder a lot of people think that book publishing is a dying industry.

The LitKicks post is a long one, and I don’t want to analyze, write about and quote everything they say, so read the post for yourself and see if your own assumptions about the publishing industry are correct. According to the post, there will be a follow-up next week about fiction and literary fiction, which is what I’m more interested in.

Yes, I realize the post right before this is talking about how the publishing industry can save itself. I think it just goes to show how complicated an issue it really is, and unless you’ve really studied the numbers and know the industry inside out, many of us overlook these complications a little too easily.

Figuring out the book business

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