English language books driving increase in Dutch sales; Audiobooks more popular
Netherlands residents bought 43.2 million books last year, 0.4 percent more than the year before. English-language books drove the sales, and physical bookstores regained their ground after losing it to online shopping during the pandemic. Audiobooks also massively spiked in popularity, the CPNB foundation reported.
The market for Dutch-language books shrunk last year. Sales of Dutch-language books dropped by 3 percent, with Dutch-language fiction seeing the most significant decrease (-10 percent).
Therefore, the increase in book sales was solely due to books in foreign languages. One in five books sold last year was a foreign-language book, and the vast majority were in English.
People in the Netherlands spent 664 million euros on books last year, an increase of 2.7 percent. “With that, 2022 was the eighth consecutive year of turnover increase,” the foundation for Dutch books said.
After two years of online book sales soaring due to the coronavirus pandemic and related stay-at-home restrictions, physical bookstores regained popularity last year. People bought 16 percent more books at physical stores, resulting in a turnover increase of 25 percent. However, physical bookstores’ sales were still slightly lower than in pre-pandemic 2019 (-2 percent). Online, 12 percent fewer books were sold, resulting in a turnover decrease of 11 percent.
Netherlands residents bought 6 percent fewer loose e-books last year than in 2021, but the popularity of subscription services for e-books and audiobooks’ skyrocketed. The number of audiobooks and e-books distributed through these services increased by 76 percent, according to an initial estimate from the CPNB. Last year, these subscription services accounted for 48 percent of the digital market, compared to 34 percent in 2021.
Libraries were also more popular last year, according to initial figures from Stichting Leenrecht. Last year, Netherlands residents borrowed about 51 million physical books and audiobooks from libraries, an increase of 34 percent compared to 2021. However, that is still well below the around 56 million books borrowed from libraries in pre-pandemic 2019.
