How to account for the upbeat note coming from most sectors of publishing at the start of 2021?

When the pandemic struck last spring, forecasts were dire, yet book sales in many sectors and across formats climbed, even soared, in 2020.

According to industry analyst Thad McIlroy, the book business has largely benefited from fence sitting: Trade, educational and academic publishers serve customers with print and digital products. The publishers themselves are large and small companies. Many are profit-driven, yet a significant number are mission-directed not-for-profits.

“What COVID is telling us that there is a renewal going on in the [publishing] industry – fortunately, a powerful one,” he tells CCC’s Chris Kenneally.

“This is a great opportunity to revisit the landscape and ask, ‘What is it that we do with physical books, and how has that changed? What is it we do with digital products – with e-books and with audiobooks – and how is that changing?”

Thad McIlroy is co-author with Cliff Guren and Steven Sieck of COVID-19 and Book Publishing: Impacts and Insights for 2021, a free, downloadable report that reviews the sector’s recent performance from multiple angles.