Frankfurt book fair open its doors

The Frankfurt book fair, the world’s largest, opens its doors this week to a publishing industry in robust health after the pandemic boosted reading -- but supply chain concerns threaten to dampen the mood.

After going almost fully digital last year to curb the coronavirus spread, this year’s fair is returning as an in-person event but will still be a more muted version of past editions. 

Fewer international exhibitors and authors are descending on the western German city than before Covid, and much of the action will be online. 

Fair director Juergen Boos, who will host the opening press ceremony on Tuesday, said “it’s still not a normal book fair” but offered a chance for the industry to “reconnect”.

It comes as the book business has been “doing pretty well over the past 18 months”, he said, with people in many countries using the slower pace of life during lockdown to read more – adolescents especially.

“Young people didn’t just want to play computer games all day,” Boos recently told reporters.

In the United States, printed book sales rose by more than eight percent in 2020 to record their best year in a decade, according to the NPD research group. 

Growth was driven by teen categories but also adult non-fiction, as people turned to cookbooks and DIY books to pass the time at home.

In Germany, the European Union’s largest book market, bookstores used the shutdowns to expand their

online sales, leading to a 20-percent jump in internet revenues to 2.2 billion euros ($2.5 billion).

Audio and e-books also saw double-digit growth.

Christmas concerns

Books “proved to be a particularly resilient and popular medium during the pandemic,” Boos said.

But the news isn’t all good. The book trade, with global revenues of around $100 billion annually, isn’t immune to the worldwide shortages of raw materials and supply chain disruptions roiling national economies as they rebound from the coronavirus downturn.

With the crucial Christmas holiday season fast approaching, publishers are sounding the alarm about paper and cardboard shortages, bottlenecks at shipping ports and a lack of lorry drivers.

“I fear that this Christmas people cannot be sure of getting any book they want at short notice,” Jonathan Beck, head of renowned German publishing house C.H. Beck, told the Handelsblatt financial daily. He also warned that books could become more expensive.

Atwood phoning in

This week’s Frankfurt gathering is the latest example of trade fairs stirring back to life, and comes after the German city of Munich welcomed 400,000 visitors to the IAA auto show in September.

Nevertheless, the pandemic will loom large over the Frankfurt fair.

Daily visitor numbers are capped at 25,000 and fairgoers must show proof of vaccination, a negative test or prove that they have recovered from Covid.