E-book sales still tiny in U.K.—but will Kindle, Sony Reader help change the game and affect p-book market?
By Paul Biba
The Sony Reader will debut in England next week, and the Amazon Kindle may very well be coming to England soon. A Times of London article article mentions both and has a number of interesting quotes from John Makinson, Chairman and Chief Executive of Penguin. I suggest you pop over to the site and read the article in full. This statement interested me the most:
Makinson said paper-based books were still his primary business and he didn’t see that changing soon. As a result, it is hard to see how it will change the publishing business. Although there is less cost associated with an e-book — no printing, warehousing or delivery — the market is still so small that when they sell an e-book they don’t know where, or whether, they are losing a sale of a physical book, said Makinson. “Consequently, we don’t manufacture or ship any fewer physical books at the moment.â€
Only when e-books reach 5% of the market will publishers get a clearer idea of how the new digital format will affect their supply chain, he said.
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