Book, newspaper sales drop

TIRANA, Aug. 7 – The book and newspaper industry are among the hardest hit from the crisis in the past three years. This is also confirmed by official data published by the state statistical institute INSTAT which shows retail sales of books and newspapers in the first quarter of 2012 were down by 9.2 percent year-on-year. Compared to the same period, the shrink is reported to be even bigger.
The significant cut in sales is also confirmed by bookshop owners and publishers who say that in times of crisis books are the first products consumers quit. The low sales and lack of interest has also cancelled the annual book fairs held in coastal cities.
Earlier this year, some of the top newspapers increased prices citing lower revenue from advertisements.
Retail sales suffered another shrink in the first quarter of this year reconfirming the difficulty businesses are facing as consumers’ purchasing power drops and their saving trend increases. Latest INSTAT data show retail sales dropped by 8.3 percent in the first quarter of this year when the Albanian economy shrank by 0.2 percent year-on-year, according to data published this week by INSTAT, the state statistical institute. Compared to the final quarter of 2011, retail sales were down by a sharp 22.5 percent.