Good Gains for Big Houses

Although there are plenty of caveats to the numbers, the country's three largest trade houses posted total sales of $2.19 billion in the first half of 2004, an increase of 6.6% over the comparable period in 2003. Among the factors that need to be considered when examining the figures is that sales for each publisher includes revenue for their entire operations, not just sales in the U.S. Also, the dollar figures have been converted from euros in the case of Random House and pounds for the Penguin Group, and currency fluctuations skew the comparisons, particularly at Penguin. Excluding currency changes, sales at Penguin in the first part of 2004 were flat with the first six months of 2003. Notwithstanding some reservations, the figures show that the three leading publishers have sold a lot of books so far this year.

Six-Month Sales at Big 3
($ in millions)