On Monday, BookExpo America event director Steve Rosato posted rough attendance figures for last week’s show on his blog, “The Bean.” Although the numbers are likely to be revised upwards after the final audit, the figures, for now, are down slightly from last year. The total verified professional attendance for BEA 2014 was 10,965, a drop of 1%; total industry professionals for 2014 was 19,860, a drop of 3%.
BookCon, as previously reported, sold out all 10,000 tickets in under three months.
How the two shows--BEA and BookCon--will fit together next year is still up for discussion, especially given that BookCon and BEA are “highly complimentary and still mutually exclusive,” as Rosato pointed out. “BEA will remain a vital trade event,” he continued, “and BookCon is poised to expand and offer new opportunities for publishers that will ultimately sell more books.”
