On Monday, it was announced that Harper Collins purchased Thomas Nelson.
So what, right?
Let’s look at this announcement a little closer:
- HarperCollins is the third largest trade publisher in the United States.
- Thomas Nelson is the seventh largest trade publisher.
- Since Zondervan and HarperOne are already under the HarperCollins umbrella, half of the entire Christian trade publishing will be in the hands of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp.
We should take a pause and think about what really fuels Christian publishing. Even if those working for the Christian branches of publishing are Christians themselves, it all comes down to dollars and cents.
Don’t get me wrong. I don’t think Christian books, music and media should be passed out for free, but I’m afraid there will inevitably be effects.
Just as many Christian musicians have moved out from underneath the established Christian music label scene, I can see this happening to book publishing.
Just as mp3’s and affordable recording gear has made way for independent and self produced record labels, I can see e-readers and digital books enabling Christian authors to do the same.
What effects do you see from this, if any?
[via Andy Unedited | Image via Martin Gommel]
Eric J says
Ahh this makes me so sad! It really bothers me that a lot the christian music labels and now half of the christian books are owned by secular corporations.
Eric Dye says
You and me both.
Adam Shields says
I am concerned. But I think my bigger concern is the general publishing industry. I read, a lot. Probably too much. And while I think there are really great books being published, there is far too much junk. Stuff that does not matter, that is duplicate of everything else out there, that is just poorly written.
Ideally, consolidation would also mean that these publishers would actually think more about what they are publishing and put out less junk. But it won’t. What will happen is that more money will go to marketing and less to editing.
Because honestly, the real competitor to publishing is the independents. The people that will never sell much, but will keep writing. Some of these independents are really good, some should not be allowed near a word processor.
Here is what I think is the opportunity. The barriers to entry for publishing are at an all time low. You can put together a book, maintain zero stock, have a print on demand system and ebooks and still sell books. So denominations and non-profits that really care about particular areas probably should start planning on loosing some money and start putting out literature as mission. Put some money where you mouth is. If you think a message needs to be shared, share it. I have a number of friends that are just putting out their own independent books. They are not messing with the traditional publishing routes and they are doing it well. But there is sacrifice. They don’t get upfront money to write the book. They have to pay for layouts and design out of their own pocket, up front. But for some it is worth it.
Eric J says
Your friends also get more control 😉
Adam Shields says
More control, overall less money, but the potential for a lot more if the book actually sells.
Amanda Hocking is an independent fiction author that wrote 17 novels. Over the past couple years she has made more then $3 million as a independent author primarily selling ebooks. For every Amanda Hocking are a several dozen that only sell a handful of books.
I don’t remember where I saw this, but I think I saw something that said that about half of all Amazon ebooks do not sell more than 10 copies a year.
MGalloway says
While it may be true that the barriers to distribution are at an all time-low, the readers in the end become the ultimate gatekeepers. I think initially right now there is going to be a surge in the amount of people writing books, but those numbers will eventually level off as would-be writers realize how much work is actually involved in writing a book, editing it (or having it edited), and promoting it.
Adam Shields says
Maybe, but there have been about 1 million books a year published in English for the last several years. That is far beyond the rate that the market can really support.
MGalloway says
Is there really a limit to the what the market can support, though? I’m not sure what the numbers are, but there is also quite a bit of music and software out there too…some of it is self-published, some of it comes through traditional channels.
In the case of books, if a title is strong enough (regardless of who publishes it) and there is enough visibility for it, the market will gravitate towards that title/author.
Eric Dye says
In a consumer driven market, the Church is partially to blame. I was hoping you would weigh-in, Adam. Thanks!
carlos says
I think we’d be fooling ourselves if we thought that the emphasis on profit will be a new thing. None of the Christian publishing houses would have lasted long enough to be bought by secular companies if they weren’t profitable. If you want to look at the altruistic tendencies of strictly Christian publishers look to the prices on e-books from these companies, a place where they could have dropped out the costs of printing and distribution and still made the same amount of profit……
Andrew Ledwith says
I could be wrong about this as I’ve never looked at the numbers, but my impression is that the e-reader has had a slower adoption rate than the MP3 player. I agree that the same things that took place in the music industry can happen to the book industry and, on a long enough timeline, almost certainly will. The big difference is that Apple and its competitors made it normal for a person to own an MP3 player. Neither Amazon, nor B&N, nor Apple has yet made it normal to own an e-reader. I think that’s the tipping point that will force the big publishing houses to rethink their business model.
Adam Shields says
Went back and looked at mp3 player adoption rates. In Feb 2005 (about 5 years after ipod came out) about 12 percent of all people had an ipod/mp3 player.
As of June 2011, not quite 5 years after the Kindle came out, about 12 percent of adults have a dedicated ereader. Also 8 percent of people have a tablet (there is overlap, so it is probably about 15-16 percent have one or the other or both).
So it is about the same rate of adoption. In both cases, high consumers are much more likely to have a device.
Adam Shields says
Here is a blog post from a book seller. http://bookshoptalk.wordpress.com/2011/11/02/harpercollins-to-acquire-thomas-nelson/
Eric Dye says
Insightful. Thanks, Adam.
Phil says
My concern isn’t so much that a secular corp. effectively owns the Christian market. It’s still about money.
My concern/frustration is in which “Corp” bought it. I’m a political independent who leans conservative, but I hate News Corp and its unthinking unreasonable brand of conservatism. As it is, I have to avoid Christian book stores as the elections approach. Why? Because every Republican candidate, even the expressly un-Christian ones, has a book for sale on the end caps of Christian book stores.
The Church has become way too political (read “Republican”) in many ways, and I’m afraid that this will only increase that trend.
Adam Shields says
I understand the concern, but I don’t think it will really matter. If you look at who publishes a lot of the conservative political books it is Thomas Nelson, not Zondervan. Zondervan, which is the one that has been owned by Fox is fairly non-political. Thomas Nelson, which has been independent has made a lot of money peddling Sarah Palin, William Bennett, etc.
If anything I would expect more of those political books to move to other Harper Collins imprints and Thomas Nelson to focus more on the religious books.
Phil says
That’s a good point.
Robert Treskillard says
I’m not really concerned about this change in the industry. Zondervan has been able to run independently since HarperCollins bought them, and I expect the same for Thomas Nelson. The transition to digital threatens to change publishing far more than this does.