In a new report documented by The Guardian, figures suggest that paper-copy books are still the preferential choice as eBook sales rapidly decrease.
The news comes as results from a recent survey show how young people, particularly juniors, prefer to read a real book as opposed to a digital copy.
In total, over 360 million books were sold in 2016. This figure indicates a commendable 2% increase, in a year that saw UK consumers spend an extra 6% or £100 million on books in print and eBook formats. Another interesting finding that the survey revealed was that bookshop sales have increased 6%, too – great news for those suffering at the hands of competitively-priced online bookstores.
As bookstore purchases rose by 7% in 2016, eBook sales simultaneously declined, taking a dive of 4%. This means that for the second consecutive year, eBook sales have plummeted.
The Publishers Association revealed that in 2015, digital content sales had dropped by almost £10m, plummeting from £563m to £553m. Contrastingly, paper book sales had soared, rising from £2.74bn to £2.76bn. In fact, even some of the biggest UK publishers had taken a hit, with results from The Bookseller finding that collectively, eBook sales had fallen a considerable 2.4% in 2015.
According to the Publishers Association, these figures are down to one fundamental fact – readers simply don’t get the same satisfaction from reading an eBook: ‘Readers take pleasure in a physical book that does not translate well onto digital’, the report read.
So, if you’re a traditional book lover, you can rest comfortably knowing that eBooks will not be taking over just yet!
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Happy reading!
The Printerbase Team
