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Brazilian Publishers Report Negligible eBook Sales in 2015

372032100_5d064f3568_oEarlier this week I reported that that ebook downloads in Brazil far outnumbered sales, and now it looks like current sales data from Brazilian publishers are bearing that out.

eBookNews.com.br has the scoop new data which shows that Brazilian publishers are selling a negligible amount of ebooks.

According to the latest edition of the Produção e Vendas do Setor Editorial Brasileiro report from the Fundação Instituto de Pesquisas Econômicas (Fipe), 189 Brazilian book publishers reported selling around $5.8 million USD in ebooks last year, for a total of 1.26 million units.

That’s a 21% increase in revenue, which sounds great until we see that in comparison, those same publishers reported 389 million books worth $1.48 billion USD in total revenue in 2015 (all stats converted from the original Brazilian real R$, or BRL).

Of course, the above stats don’t reflect the brazolian market any more that an AAP Statshot report is an accurate summary of the US book market, but as far as those publishers are concerned, ebooks are still a negligible part of the market.

But not necessarily because of the price. The average price of an ebook in Brazil went from $3.92 USD in 2014 to $4.58 in 2015, while at the same time ebook unit sales rose 5% and the total sales volume rose  21%.

You can find the 2015 report here, and the  2014 and 2013 reports are also available.

image by flavouz

 

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Comments


Steve Vernon June 5, 2016 um 5:45 am

A lot of the problem might fall upon the publishers themselves, Nate.

I can’t speak for Brazilian publishers – but I know that none of our regional publishers here in Nova Scotia have any clear sort of an idea on how to market e-books, beyond just getting them out on Kindle and Kobo and letting them just sit there.

I am not saying that this would be the ONLY possible reason for such poor sales figures – but I’d bet a tall cold beer that it is a definite factor.


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