At the new Future! Publish event in Berlin, HarperCollins’ Chantal Restivo-Alessi talks about publishing when ‘digital is here to stay.’
Germany’s De Gruyter Tests PDA…Patron Driven Acquisition, That Is
By Siobhan O’Leary German academic publisher De Gruyter is teaming up with the Forschungszentrum Jülich to test out an acquisition model that aims to better align library spending with customer demand. With “Patron Driven Acquisition” (i.e. acquisition that is determined by customers), a library borrows or purchases a book only when there is a specific demand for it. According to …
Why Multichannel Bookselling is the Future
Bricks-and-mortar stores give booksellers a “human face,” but in the future most books will be sold online. Making the two sales channels complimentary is key. By Amanda DeMarco BERLIN: Anyone who’s been following German book industry publications over the past nine months or so has witnessed the rising popularity of the term “multichannel book selling.” It’s not a new concept, …
Exit Elisabeth Ruge: Bloomsbury’s Intl. Reorg Ousts Berlin Verlag Co-founder, MD
By Siobhan O’Leary When Bloomsbury announced a substantial restructuring of its global operations about three weeks ago, it wasn’t immediately clear how the changes would impact Germany’s Berlin Verlag, which was acquired by Bloomsbury in 2003. Berlin Verlag has now announced that Elisabeth Ruge, co-founder of the press and managing director since 2005, will be stepping down as of March …
End of Year Sales Bode Well for German E-book Market
By Siobhan O’Leary German book chain Thalia reported its highest sales to date for its Oyo Reader in December, according to buchreport. The device — which reached stores in November — was one of Thalia’s top 5 bestselling products and, perhaps surprisingly, most of them were sold in-store rather than online. Thalia witnessed a corresponding increase in e-book sales, with figures …
German Book Title Production Drops 7% in 2010
By Siobhan O’Leary New releases in Germany in 2010 were once again heavily weighted toward fiction titles, which accounted for an overall share of 70% of new titles published (up from 66% in 2009). However, overall title production was down 7% compared to 2009 and 9% compared to the long-term average. According to buchreport, a total of 5431 new titles …