September Bookstore Sales Manage Modest Growth

Posted Friday, Nov 30, 2001

Considering the events of September 11, bookstore sales in September must be considered quite respectable, as they managed to exceed sales for the previous September by 6.7 percent. Preliminary sales of $1,621 million for September 2001 compared favorably with the $1,519 million performance of September 2000.

September bookstore sales continued the robust performance of bookstore sales of the last two years, and continued to outperform overall retail. Preliminary overall September retail sales of $272 billion were 2.2 percent below the $278 billion in sales recorded the previous September.

This was the 20th month in a row that bookstore sales exceeded sales of the previous year.

2000-2001 RETAIL SALES for BOOKSTORES (unadjusted)
2000 Final (Millions of Dollars)
2001 (Millions of Dollars)
Increase (2001 over 2000)
January
1,552
1,771
14.1
February
1,133
1,213
7.1
March
1,077
1,214
12.7
April
1,024
1,078
5.3
May
1,166
1,238
6.2
June
1,191
1,251
5.0
July
1,120
1,171
4.6
August
1,708
2,119
24.1
September
1,519
1,621(p)
6.7
YTD
11,490
12,676
10.3

(p) Preliminary figure

NOTE: Estimates reflect sales of all types of participating bookstores, including trade, college, religious, chain stores (including superstores), and others. A bookstore is defined as any retail establishment with sales comprised of more than 50 percent new books and periodicals, and estimates include sales of all products in these stores.

SPECIAL NOTE: As of March 2001, the Bureau of the Census, Current Retail Trade Branch, began using the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) in place of the Standard Industrial Classification System (SIC). The Bureau of the Census has restated the SIC data for monthly sales to a NAICS basis to create an historic series beginning with January 1992 through March 2001.

Source: Bureau of the Census, Current Retail Trade Branch.

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