Quote:
Originally Posted by keeska
My only concern would be if the sales of pbooks fell so low that publishers stopped printing them or the prices skyrocket due to limited availability.
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Both are on the horizon.
Harlequin was just sold because they depended heavily on mass market paperbacks and that market is no longer all that mass-ive. Print editions are being moved to the more expensive formats.
And that is why the ebook/pbook ratio matters.
The other ratio that matters is the ratio of backlist revenue to new release revenue. It currently stands at 31% for ebooks and growing.
Publisher revenue comes from three categories: bestsellers, midlist, and backlist; the bigger the backlist revenue becomes (especially in ebook form), the less important the midlist becomes. Especially for print editions. Already the big publishers are floating a new standard contract that doesn't guarantee print editions to midlisters. So a lot of new books are only going to be released in ebook form.