The Brazil Book Trade in 1998
Sally Taylor -- 8/1/98
With 160 million people, Brazil is the 8th largest book market in the world, equal to the rest of Latin America combined. With 51,460 new and reprinted titles in 1997, they had a nearly 20% growth, but sales declined by 3% in 1997 to US$1.84 billion.
While more books were published, people bought fewer copies. Textbooks and religious books volumes declined but general books showed a 3% gain, according to the Brazilian Book Chamber. So the answer is going to be finding new readers, and books that appeal to them.
President Fernando Henrique Cardoso seems to have tamed the economic gremlins the country suffered in the eighties and a McKinsey report out earlier this year predicts a sustainable 6% growth. The stock market crash last fall, which was linked to the Asia crisis, and high interest rates resulting from the country's efforts to defend the currency, the real, have not made 1997 an easy year. But there is much optimism.
While the middle class is still struggling with the high inflation, publishers are spreading their wings in the stable economy with more local titles and lower prices to reach the new readers, those from the lower classes, who could not afford books before.
Also changing is the way books are sold. There are still less than 1000 retail stores for a reading population of roughly five million. The major retailers Saraiva and Siciliano, while they are creating larger stores and more shelf space to attract new readers, are also getting more involved in publishing themselves, creating yet more competition in the market and causing concern among publishers that they will be squeezed off the shelves.
The arrival of two major international investors into Brazil's book industry changed attitudes this summer. The French consortium running FNAC, a major book retailer, bought ¡tica Shopping and has kept its ambitious expansion plan.
From the USA, Darby Overseas Investments bought a $15 million interest in Livrarias Siciliano, which plans to expand all over Brazil.
Publishers
The top five literature houses in Brazil today are Record, Compania das Letras, Rocco, Objetiva and Nova Fronteira.
The only new one is Objetiva, which soared to success on the strength of a few very well chosen authors, not the least of whom is Paulo C lho, who came to them with "Fifth Mountain," lured by their half million dollar advance and an equally aggressive marketing war chest.
"Last year was our best to date," says Publisher Roberto Feith. "Our total revenue was $10 million, up 35% over the year before. It is a little less than we projected, but when interest rates went up to defend the real it dampened sales."
Feith hopes that new products launching in the second half of 1998 will help push up the 98 figures. Sixty new books are planned for this year and another 60 in 99.
Of their current top five titles, only one is a translation, but it is David Goldman's Emotional Intelligence, which has sold 275,000 copies in two years.
Brazil has one of the fastest growing populations of internet users, according Claudio Rothmuller, Founder and Managing Director of Editora Campus in Rio. Part of the Elsevier Science group, Campus runs independently and is active in business and computer titles, together with some health and serious nonfiction, both translations and originals.
As the computer book leader, they have been active in online sales from the gitgo, with a strong website getting 12,000 hits a month.
There are two major book ordering services in Brazil now, Rothmuller notes: Livraria Cultura which includes bestseller lists for computer, business and non-fiction titles, their specialties; and BookNet is more general in scope and includes a half dozen retail stores, as well.
In terms of titles published Ediouro Publicac s, S/A is also remarkable. Sixty years old, they have 20 bookshops, have produced 3500 titles and made $6 million in profit in 1996, though 70% of the business is printing and textbooks are the strongest part of the publishing operations.
At their combination printing, publishing and warehouse in the industrial zone of Rio, Jorge Carneiro, the young President, introduced PW to Jose Bantim Duarte from Atica, now onboard to help with administration.
"The Ediouro tradition is our classical catalog, much of it translations" says Carneiro, who took the reins of the family firm six years ago. "But we have a wide range of new titles and our strategy in retail is changing, thanks to the counsel of Maria Angela Villela, our editorial director."
"For example, we do the Patricia Wells food books on France. Twenty years ago Brazilians didn't travel. Now we can sell 2000 copies a month of her books. "
Retailing
Pioneer megastore retailer in Brazil, major textbook house and a major music retailer in the country, Editora Saraiva is one of three publicly held publishing concerns in Brazil. Director Wander Soares has great hopes for the future of his country.
"We have 48 million students, 30% of the population. And the Government buys the textbooks for first eight grades, which are free and mandatory. So there will be increased pressure to expand secondary and university education."
Saraiva had four megastores (90,000 titles, plus music, plus cyber cafe) in 1997, now they have ten.
"We plan to have shops averaging 15,000 square feet, most of the bigger ones in malls," says Soares, who worked for Atica for 15 years before moving over to Saraiva. "We want to get people who watch a movie at a mall to pass our store and buy a book about the film. Malls have free parking, bathrooms, comfortable environments for families with children... We can pull in the young people with the music and magazines, then get them buying books, as well."
Siciliano is another major retailer in Brazil, as well as an importer of art and pocket books. With 70 retail outlets now, all in the "best places" they are planning 15 more before the year 2000, according to Vicente Siciliano Junior, the retailing director. His cousin Oswaldo Siciliano is in charge of rights
"Five years ago, we were selling a lot of computer titles. Now, it is mainly astrology and alternative living, along with fiction and non-fiction," he says. "In the next five years I think self-help will continue to be big, and we are publishing more of it, and 30% of the list is now translations."
The company has four lists: Carmel for children, Mondarin for fiction and non-fiction, Berkeley for computers and Futura for business books and self-help.
Siciliano is also selling books on the web. Their site launched in February of this year (see box) and includes all books in print in Portuguese.
Rights
Brazil is linked to the USA, economically and culturally, if not linguistically. The USA is also the biggest trade investor. So it is no surprise it is an important rights market for the future.
"Brazil has been a very challenging market for us,"says Cindy Faith Ross, who handles South America and Asia for Warner Bros. Worldwide Publishing, under Michael Harkavy.
"Brazil is an emerging market where new distribution channels are opening up, such as mass market retail. Understanding the marketplace is critical to building our business. We are beginning to see the results of our efforts over the past several years and are very excited with the progress being made."
"Things are doing all right on a general perspective," says very active rights agent Lucia Riff of BMSR Agencia Literaria in Rio. "But the situation right now is not good at all. The economy is not growing as it should, and the sales have fallen these last months.
"The year of '98 was not expected to be good due to the World Cup and the Elections for president, governors and congress. But we're optimistic about 99!"
One good example of an American bestseller that went well in Brazil is Into Thin Air. "It got wonderful reviews and excellent sales," says Riff. Cold Mountain has been contracted, but not published yet.
"Angela's Ashes got the best reviews, but didn't get good sales, unfortunately. The Color of Water got excellent reviews as well, and we have good expectations for it," Riff continues.
Another good example of success is James Ellroy. His books do very well.
"The main interest is on non-fiction titles, especially the ones on Intelligence, Education, Families, Health, Spirituality and Business. As for fiction, it's difficult to bring in new voices, foreign or not!"
Brazil's longtime rights maven, Karin Schindler, reported similarly. "What we are not doing in Brazil now is science fiction, gothic and westerns. We still do business, self-help, how-to and fiction, but only good fiction, even though the advances are lower. Things are not booming here, but they are stabilized."
A good example is 24-year-old Amarylis Manole, running her family's stand at the Bienal, an inviting and hip design, featuring books on the Spice Girls and Leonardo di Caprio.
"My father started this company with medical titles," she explains to PW simply. "Now, I do Hollywood. My brother, Roberto, g s to Bologna for the children's titles, which he and my father started three years ago. We've got 170 titles now with Disney and won a prize last year for the number of copies we've sold. And we have a lot of the Intervisual titles, too and DK. We work directly with many different publishers now."
See a list of Publishing Resources in Brazil.
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