Fallout From Borders Closing Hits July Bookstore Sales Numbers

Looks like we are finally seeing the fallout from the liquidation of Borders Booksellers. Publishers Weekly is reporting that July bookstore sales were down 4%:

The impact of the closing of Borders’s stores is starting to show up in industry numbers. According to preliminary estimates released Wednesday morning by the Census Bureau, bookstore sales fell 4.2% in July, the steepest decline in 2011. Sales dropped to $982 million from $1.02 billion in July 2010. The July decline followed a 1.9% drop in June and as a result bookstore sales for the first seven months of 2011 were down 0.5%, to $8.03 billion.

Sales for the entire retail segment rose 6.2% in July and 7.9% for the first seven months of 2011.

It will be interesting to see how bookstore sales do after the fallout from Borders comes to an end. I’m predicting print book sales will continue to decline while ebook sales will increase.

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