Some Interesting Statistics....

Here are some interesting of statistics on the publishing industry that might be helpful. See the following URL for these statistics, and more.

http://www.parapublishing.com/getpage.cfm?file=statistics/index.html

1. 42% of college graduates never read another book.
2. 80% of US families did not buy or read a book last year.
3. 70% of US adults have not been in a bookstore in the last five years.
4. 57% of new books are not read to completion.
5. On average it takes 475 hours to write a fiction title and 725 hours to write a nonfiction title.
6. It takes an average of 531 hours to produce a book-422 hours for fiction, 550 hours for nonfiction.
7. An average of 10 to 15 hours are spent designing a book cover.
8. On average, 61 hours are spent in the editing process.
9. On average, 29 hours are spent producing a news release for a new book.
10. The five large New York publishers accounted for 45% of the market. They grossed $4.1 billion.
11. 78% of the titles published come from the small/self-publishers.
12. Nearly all bestsellers come from five publishing conglomerates.
13. 80% of the book sales are controlled by five conglomerates: Bertlesman (Random House), Rupert Murdoch's News Corp, Time Warner, Disney and Viacom/CBS.
14. The breakdown of genres/categories that people are buying: 55% Popular fiction; 10% Religious nonfiction; 9% Cooking/Crafts
15. Most initial print runs are 5,000 copies.
16. A larger publisher must sell 10,000 books to break even.
17. A successful fiction book sells 5,000 copies.
18. A successful nonfiction book sells 7,500 copies.
19. On the average, a book store browser spends eight seconds looking at the front cover and 15 seconds looking at the back cover.
20. 81% of the population feels they have a book inside them.
21. 6 million have written a manuscript.
22. Out of every 10,000 children's books, 3 get published.
23. Up to 40% of all books manufactured never sell. Most publishers would rather suffer the costs of over-runs and returns than run short of a title.
24. LA Times receives 600 to 700 books for review each week.
25. Many advances for books are between $1,500 and $7,500.
26. 70% of the books published do not earn out their advance
27. 80% of the books published by major houses come through agents.
28. 5,000 novels, 200 first novels and 100 scripts are purchased each year.

I find a lot of these statistics a bit depressing. On the other hand, I am not sure that I actually believe them all either, because it is pretty easy to lie with statistics.

One of my favorite parts of this page is a quote from Gore Vidal: "Half of the American people have never read a newspaper. Half have never voted for President. One hopes it is the same half."