Thursday, November 11, 2004

Megahits and publishing We've talked before about the transformation of the publishing world from a gentleman's club just another branch of a media/marketing oligopoly. The pressure to make profits is greater than ever, since these profits are being measured against those of a hit movie, record, or TV show, compared to which the generous profits of a typical bestseller is hardly exciting. Of late, however, the book industry has started to see superblockbusters that make John Grisham, Stephen king, and Tom Clancy books look like small potatoes. This new concept is being reinforced by the success of Mitch Albom's novel, The Five People You Meet in Heaven, which is slated to sell over five million hardbound copies. According to a Wall Street Journal article )"To Publishers, Megahits Mean Very Big Numbers", 11/2/2004), that's a figure that is starting to become a new benchmark. As the article notes, Back in the early 1990s, a book that sold one million hardcovers was a phenomenon. Today the bar is higher, driven by such books as Dan Brown's "The Da Vinci Code," which has sold more than eight million copies in the U.S. since it was published in March 2003 "Five million has become the new one million," says Bob Miller, president of Hyperion [Alstom's publisher, a division of Disney]. Other five-million plus books include the Harry Potter books, Alstom's earlier Sundays with Morrie, and Rick Warren's The Purpose-Driven Life. A megahit like these can bring in profits exceeding $15 million, according to the article, a figure that can brighten up any publisher's balance sheet. But the problem with blockbusters is that they become an obsession. And publishers are tempted to swing for the fences every time, with enormous advances and big campaigns for those books they (often inaccurately) identify as big hits. The WSJ article quotes Lawrence Kirshbaum, CEO of Time-Warner, as cautioning against this temptation "Corporations want steady growth, which means a regular stream of hits as opposed to one grand slam followed by 10 strikeouts." But that grand slam can cover a lot of shortcomings. The article points out that publishers are, more than ever, likely to ignore little-known writers and subjects that have no chance of being megahits. That's always been a problem, where publishers will spend liberally on pushing pre-selected hit possibilities and allowing unfavored book to die swift deaths, but it seems to be getting worse The more money that goes into advances as publishing houses battle for the few megawriters, the less that goes to mere moderate-selling writers. Furthermore, megahits emphasize the role of Wal-Mart, Costco and others, at the expense of bookstores, even large chains like Borders and Barnes & Noble that carry more than a few titles at time. "Our focus is shrinking as a culture," says Hyperion's Mr. Miller. "Fewer books are breaking out." In an exercise of its oligopoly power, Disney is not only publishing the book, it is supporting that publication with an upcoming ABC-TV movie based on the book. That's an example of the synergy that media giants have been dreaming about for years. 5:27:56 PM

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