A Different Way to Look at Book Sales

I promise this is not depressing!

TGIF. Yesterday, I submitted my final MBA project! It was a brand audit of Consumer Cellular, which was intense and exciting. I also wrote a paper about J. Crew and what they should do to achieve brand longevity. Something I loved about my MBA program was examining other industries because studying them made me look at book publishing differently. My graduation is in New Hampshire on May 4, and I will see if I get accepted into the University of Maryland’s DBA (Doctor of Business Administration) program. I’m not 100% sure I’ll go for my doctorate, but I’m strongly considering it. Book Therapy will resume on Friday, May 10. Thank you for your kind words and well wishes about my MBA. It is appreciated more than you know.

Today’s newsletter will be quick. I want to explain something about book sales that is often overlooked. Let’s dive in.

Publishers don’t disclose first-printing numbers (a first printing is the number of books initially printed for a book), so I’m not surprised people haven’t written about the correlation between book sales and first printings. However, looking at sales in the context of a book’s first printing is important. Allow me to explain.

Example 1:

Publisher X has retail orders for a debut novel totaling 2500 copies, so they decided to print 3500 copies to fulfill those orders and have a cushion. Some of the cushion might be allocated for publicity purposes (publicity copies are always factored into first printings, which is why you always need to tell your publisher if you’re doing events, etc.). You might think, “Wow, 3000 copies are nothing,” but you’d be wrong. First, paper has become expensive, as has shipping. Second, debut novels are a tough sell, and most of those copies are probably going to Amazon. Third, having a modest first printing, selling most of it, and moving to a second printing is far better. Why? Because when publishers overprint, they are stuck with returns or books sitting in warehouses. Ultimately, the copies get destroyed if nothing else happens for the overprinted book. How does this relate to sales? Well, your first printing is an essential baseline for your sales. If your book had a printing of 3000 copies and all of them were sold, it’s a good thing. If the book continues to sell, and the publisher continues to print and ship copies, those 3000 books can turn into 10,000. If your book continues to sell with each printing, it can become a backlist title.

Example 2:

Publisher Y acquired the second book from an author whose debut sold modestly. They felt the new one had more potential, so they kept the author on their list. The author’s debut had a first printing of 5000 copies but only sold 2000 within the first 6-7 months. The debut continues to sell at a slow pace. Orders for the author’s second book total 9000, and the author is doing events, so the publisher prints 12,000 copies. The bookstores where events are held will sell the debut and the second book. Now you have a situation where there’s a chance that 1) the debut sells more copies, 2) the second book gains momentum, and 3) more accounts order the book because there is a decent amount of confirmed publicity. Ultimately, the debut sells an additional 1500 copies, and the second book sells 11,000 copies. The publisher decides to do a modest second printing for the second book, bringing the total to 14,000 copies. This scenario is still good for an author because it shows consistent sales over time.

Example 3:

Publisher Z acquired a juicy memoir by a celebrity with 5M followers across all their social media platforms. Accounts were excited by the book and ordered a total of 250,000 copies. A caveat: the book is embargoed, meaning no one will see it before the publication date, and retailers are only allowed to display it afterward. The publicity campaign includes a national morning show, The View, and excerpts from People Magazine. Two weeks before the publication date, the celebrity posts something controversial on social media, and their fans are horrified. All the confirmed media is canceled, but accounts still have many books in stock. 25,000 copies of the first printing were sold, and the publisher was stuck with enormous returns. This is considered a loss; depending on the advance, it might qualify as a write-off for the publisher.

Example 4:

Publisher D acquired a self-improvement book for $25K. The book’s first printing was 10,000 and has sold slowly and consistently for a year. Suddenly, indie bookstores start hand-selling copies quickly, so the publisher has some fun and tells indie bookstores that whoever sells the most copies in a week will receive a cake and t-shirts. There wasn’t much publicity for the book, but an opportunity with a brand arose, and the author gave a talk to their top sales associates. The publisher must meet demand, so it prints a whopping 50,000 copies. A year after the book was published, it hit the NYT Bestseller list. The book became a backlist staple, and the publisher continued printing copies for six years. The author, who received a modest $25K for the book, sold her second book for over $1M.

Each of these scenarios occurred at different publishing companies where I worked. I’m trying to make you see that sales are relative to the number of book copies printed because this is an essential factor in publishing equations but not one that is often explained to authors. Publishers don’t like disclosing first printings (and when they do, the numbers are inflated), but they should. If they explained the how and why to authors, feelings would not get hurt, and there would be less ambiguity. If authors had more information, they’d understand the business dynamics. Authors miss crucial information when publishers solely focus on sales without the context of first printings.

While selling 75,000 copies is considered significant in the industry, a book with a first printing of 5000 that sells out is also great. And no book sells only 12 copies. That misinformation went viral during the DOJ vs. PRH trial and has since been debunked many times.

I hope you found this helpful and encouraging.