Romance is in the air! With the celebration of Valentine’s Day just days ago, we thought it would be a good time to examine how Romance book sales have changed over the last six years. Romance books coverage has ramped up in the media during the last few years and there’s been an increasing number of young readers interested in the genre (much of it fuelled by social media — #RomanceRecs has over 390 million views on TikTok, an undeniable source of influence on book reading behaviour).
Mainstream romance stories are also seemingly becoming more representative of a wide range of experiences, backgrounds, and sexualities and we wanted to find out if the data backs up those observations.
Join us as we dive into an analysis of the sales of Romance books from 2017 to 2022 with the help of BookNet’s SalesData (our national sales tracking service for the Canadian English-language trade book market). We’ll identify the subcategories that have seen significant change in sales in recent years; review recently collected data from our Canadian Book Consumer survey; and share a preview of the data collected for the upcoming version of our yearly publication, Canadian Leisure & Reading Study.
Romance at a glance
Book buyers who responded to our Canadian Book Consumer survey reported a steady share of Romance book purchases between 2019 and 2022 — 11% of respondents said they purchased a Romance book in 2019, 10% in both 2020 and 2021, and 12% in 2022. According to new data from our Canadian Leisure & Reading Study, in 2022, 28% of ebook and print readers, and 33% of audiobook listeners read Romance books. In fact, audiobook listeners of Romance subjects increased by 154% from 2021 to 2022!
It’s fair to say that the buzz around Romance books is backed by book sales as shown in the graph below. Overall, Romance sales increased by 42% from 2017 to 2022. Interestingly, most of the increase happened during 2021 and 2022, with the latter having the highest sales of all six years.
Looking closer, sales from 2017 to 2018 decreased by 5%, this trend continues when by the end of 2019 sales had decreased by 11% compared to the previous year. 2020 was no different and also saw a decrease in sales of 3%. But the downward trend changed in 2021 when year-over-year sales saw an increase of 11% and in 2022 when the increase in year-over-year sales reached 54%.
What can we learn from taking a closer look at quarterly book sales? In the graph below, we see that in general, Romance books tend to perform best during the fourth quarter of the year — even during the thick of the pandemic. That being said, sales in 2022 were much higher throughout the year compared to previous years.
For comparison purposes, in the graph below we’ve included quarterly data from 2019 to 2022.
From pre-pandemic times (2019) to 2020, quarterly sales decreased by an average of 3%, with the second quarter seeing the most significant gap — a 21% year-over-year decrease in sales. From 2020 to 2021, sales increased by an average of 13%, with the first, second, and third quarters having year-over-year increases of 21%, 20%, and 18% respectively. The fourth quarter of 2021 saw a decrease in year-over-year sales of 7%. More recently, in 2021 and 2022, the sales of Romance books increased by an average of 54% year-over-year, with the first, second, and third quarters seeing increases of 20%, 43%, and 45%. By the fourth quarter of 2022, what seemed to be a great year got even better when year-over-year sales increased by a whopping 108%.
The Romance subcategories readers are loving
So far we’ve learned that in fact, Canadian readers are falling in love with Romance books, but out of the 30 BISAC Fiction / Romance subcategories, which topics are stealing the most hearts? In 2022, the top selling subcategories were:
Fiction / Romance / Contemporary — 49% of all Romance print book sales
Fiction / Romance / Romantic Comedy — 14% of all Romance print book sales
Fiction / Romance / Historical — 5% of all Romance print book sales
Now, let’s take a look at the categories that have seen the highest growth from 2017 to 2022.
Fiction / Romance / LGBTQ+
As mentioned earlier, the media has been reporting that Romance mainstream books are becoming more diverse and representative of a wide number of identities and sexualities. Shown in the graph below are the book sales of Fiction / Romance / LGBTQ+ titles from 2017 to 2022. Overall, this subcategory saw an increase of 10,406% over this six-year period, with the most significant growth happening between 2020 and 2022 — sales from 2020 to 2021 increased by 301% and sales from 2021 to 2022 increased by 136%.
Fiction / Romance / Workplace
Another subcategory that saw remarkable growth was Fiction / Romance / Workplace. Over the six years, this subcategory’s sales increased by 1,793%. While a good portion of the growth happened between 2021 and 2022, this category had ups and downs all throughout. From 2017 to 2018 sales increased by 188%, and the upward trend continued when in 2019 sales increased by 82% compared to the previous year. In 2020, sales dropped by 20% but went back up in 2021 with an increase of 32%. In 2022, the year of Romance, sales for this subcategory increased by 239%. Were the working-from-home arrangements from 2020 and 2021 a catalyst for the uptick in sales? We’ll never know.
Fiction / Romance / African American & Black
When we talk about Romance changing, we’re not only talking about shifting from the common heteronormative point of view, we’re also referring to stories from traditionally underrepresented races, peoples, and cultures. Over six years, this subcategory saw a growth in sales of 1,733%. From 2017 to 2018, sales of this subcategory increased by 180%, the growth continued in 2019 and 2020 when sales increased an additional 42% and 68% respectively. Following this steady growth, in 2021 year-over-year sales increased by 194%. In 2022, sales decreased by 7%.
Other subcategories that saw significant growth in sales from 2017 to 2022 were:
Fiction / Romance / New Adult — 1,179% increase in sales
Fiction / Romance / Police & Law Enforcement — 1,165% increase in sales
Fiction / Romance / Romantic Comedy — 1,053% increase in sales
Fiction / Romance / Multicultural & Interracial — 637% increase in sales
Fiction / Romance / Rock Stars — 301% increase in sales
The Romance subcategories readers are taking a break from
Readers' love for books, just like the love between protagonists, has its ups and downs. Let’s take a look at the subcategories that saw the most significant decrease in sales from 2017 to 2022.
Fiction / Romance / Later in Life
During this six-year period, the sales of Later in Life Romance saw an overall decrease of 97%. From 2017 to 2018 sales started to drop by 32%, and by 2019 and 2020 sales had continued to decrease by an additional 92% and 59% respectively. From 2020 to 2021 sales went back up by 65% but dropped again by 21% in 2022.
Fiction / Romance / Action & Adventure
From the looks of it, Romance readers are not feeling as adventurous as they did back in 2017. In six years, the sales of this subcategory saw an overall decrease in sales of 86%. From 2017 to 2018 sales started to drop by 37% and continued to decrease by an additional 52% in 2019. In 2020, the decrease in sales was not as dramatic (9%), but in 2021 sales decreased by 48%. In 2022 sales remained flat compared to the previous year.
Fiction / Romance / Time Travel
Time Travel Romance books suffered a similar fate. From 2017 to 2022 the sales of this subcategory decreased by 84%. Year-over-year sales decreased by 32% in 2018 and continued to drop by 44%, 17%, 24%, and 33% in 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022 respectively.
Other subcategories that saw a significant decrease in sales from 2017 to 2022 were:
Fiction / Romance / Military — 84% decrease in sales
Fiction / Romance / Sports — 79% decrease in sales
Fiction / Romance / Suspense — 76% decrease in sales
Fiction / Romance / Western — 68% decrease in sales
Fiction / Romance / Erotic — 55% decrease in sales
Are Canadians falling for Romance?
That’s a big yes from us. While it’s hard to predict the future of Romance book sales, by looking at the data we shared above, we can confirm that Romance is having a moment. Whether it will go away once BookTokers get tired of talking about Colleen Hoover’s tear-jerking books, we’ll have to wait and see.
But beyond the volatility of social media, it’s safe to say that readers' interests are changing. Presenting an opportunity for the industry to continue publishing books where people from all kinds of backgrounds, abilities, body sizes, races, genders, sexualities, and age ranges can see themselves reflected and falling in love over and over.
Looking for ways to access similar data? SalesData has got you covered! With a SalesData account, you can create one-time or ongoing reports that will help you identify trends and changes — like the ones we just shared with you. Learn more about SalesData and its reporting features here.
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