Sales Rise At HBG US, But Decline Across Lagardere Publishing

via Publishers Lunch

At Lagardere, sales at the book publishing division fell 46 million euros in the third quarter, down 7.4 percent overall (and 4.1 percent on a currency neutral, like-for-like business). Results for their international portfolio were quite mixed. Sales at HBG USA were up 11 percent, "particularly with the success of Nicholas Sparks' The Longest Ride." But even with the second two volumes of the Fifty Shades trilogy and Dan Brown's Inferno, their big French division suffered large drops in both "general literature" and education. The education segment remained weak in Spain as well, were sales declined modestly.

The UK group appears to still lag as well, with sales down 3.9 percent, "impacted by the sharp downturn in international activities (New Zealand and Australia)." Despite the surprise bestseller from JK Rowling writing initially as Robert Galbraith, Hachette cited difficult comparisons in multiple territories to the same period a year ago, when the published Rowling's The Casual Vacancy.

Odder still, in a Bookseller article the UK group is saluted for "record-breaking" ebook sales in one month of that quarter, August (also thanks to Rowling). Hachette UK ceo Tim Hely-Hutchinson tells them, despite the parent company's report, that "we are now looking at a very strong last quarter from every division in the group."


eBooks comprised 27 percent of adult sales in the US and 30 percent of adult sales in the UK, accounting for 9.4 percent of Lagardere Publishing's overall revenues in the quarter -- up from 6.4 percent in the same quarter a year ago.
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