A quarter million books sold at recent Bookfest book fair in Romania, publishers record mixed results

Book publishers had mixed results at the recent book fair in Bucharest, Bookfest. The bad weather for most of the five days of the fair prevented some people from visiting, but in the end 95,000 attended. Most publishers recorded sales increases compared to the previous edition, but there were also some whose revenues were lower than during last year's fair, and some who recorded flat revenues. With free entry to the fair, some 95,000 visitors came to see the stands of the 200 publishing houses in attendance, and those who bought something spent on average EUR 15. Out of 1 million books, 250,000 were sold. In total, 40,000 book titles were on sale at this year's edition of the fair, according to data from the organizers. Polirom, which organized 40 book launch events during Bookfest, saw its sales up by 8 percent on the 2012 fair. For Humanitas, RAO, Litera and ALL publishing houses, sales were flat during Bookfest this year. The biggest increase came for Curtea Veche, 18 percent more in sales, aided by the heavy discounting on the last day of the fair, with books down to half their original price. For Nemira, a drop of 15 percent in sales was recorded, and for Grupul Niculescu, a 5 percent decrease in sales compared to last year's fair. The first Bookfest edition was organized in 2006 and the event’s partner is the Romanian Ministry of Culture. editor@romania-insider.com (photo source: Bookfest on Facebook)