Canadian book sales are substantially higher in the first weeks of 2009. Unit sales were up 10% and dollars sold up 6% in January 2009 when compared to sales in the same time period of the 2008.

Canadian book sales in 2008 remained strong with book sales 6% higher in units and 2% higher in dollars in the last three months of 2008 than they were over the same time period in 2007. “These are strong numbers considering both the economic climate and the winter climate this year,” says Michael Tamblyn, CEO of BookNet Canada.

Stephenie Meyer, author of the Twilight series, takes four out of the five top selling books of 2008. Meyer was outsold only by Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose. BookNet Canada SalesData shows that Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight, Breaking Dawn, Eclipse, and New Moon followed A New Earth, in that order.

The five titles chosen as finalists for CBC’s Canada Reads 2009 panel have seen an average sales increase of more than 1700%. The Book of Negroes, written by Lawrence Hill and published by HarperCollins, is the number one selling shortlist title in the first week after the announcement was made.

In the four weeks ending November 23, 2008, book sales in Canada are 4.9% higher in units and 2% higher in dollars in 2008 than they were in 2007. With Nielsen BookScan UK reporting that UK book sales remain down year-over-year for a fifth consecutive week as of late November and Nielsen and comScore’s prediction of flat or negative growth in U.S. for the holiday season, Canada might be the only English book market still in positive territory.

In the week ending November 16, 2008, the first since Penguin Canada’s Through Black Spruce was named the 2008 Scotiabank Giller Prize winner, Canadian sales for the title spiked by more than 560%. Joseph Boyden’s first novel, Three Day Road, also saw a significant increase in sales. The trade paper edition of the title sold 160% more units in the week after the win than it did in the week before.

Analysis of consumer book spending shows the influence of ‘desperation dollars’ in the Humour, Performing Arts and Sports sections of Canadian bookstores during the holiday rush, especially in the last week before Christmas. A comparison of category market share in December vs. the rest of the year shows that subjects like Humour, Performing Arts and Sports/Recreation see large relative increases over the holiday season.

Think ‘Canadian’, ‘innovation’, and ‘bookselling’ are a three-way contradiction in terms? On Thursday, March 6, 2008, Todd Anderson will address the BookNet Canada Technology Forum, describing how the University of Alberta Bookstore is making waves after becoming the only campus bookstore in the world with a Print-On-Demand Espresso Book Machine.

Big category winners for 2007 are apparent in BookNet Canada’s annual review of the Canadian trade book industry, The Canadian Book Market 2007. Due to the power of the Potter and Stephenie Meyer, Juvenile Fiction led all other categories by a wide margin. Not so in percentage jump over 2006 results though—for that, we can look to some of the other big books of 2007.

According to BookNet Canada’s BNC SalesData, the 2008 Scotiabank Giller Prize finalists saw an average volume increase of nearly 195% in the first week after the shortlist was announced. Leading the pack in percent increase is Barnacle Love, the debut short story collection by Anthony De Sa. Published by Doubleday, Barnacle Love saw a sales bump of 350% in just five days after the shortlist was made public.

2007 was a hard year to keep The Secret with Rhonda Byrne’s bestselling title edging out all competition to finish number one overall. BookNet Canada SalesData shows The Secret was 2007’s top-selling book and the only non-fiction title on this year’s top five selling titles. And no surprises for wizard fans: topping the fiction category was Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows while our homegrown favorite remained Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures for the second year running.

The five titles chosen as finalists for CBC’s Canada Reads 2008 panel have seen an average sales increase of more than 4200%. Icefields, written by Thomas Wharton and published by NeWest Publishers, is the top selling title out of the five in the first week after the announcement.

In the week ending November 11, 2007, the first since Late Nights on Air was named the 2007 Scotiabank Giller Prize winner, sales across Canada spiked by almost 630%. BookNet Canada’s analysis of winners from previous years shows that the Giller is gold not only for well-established authors but for emerging talent as well.

Five days remain before the 2007 Scotiabank Giller Prize winner will be announced and the latest rankings have Divisadero remaining at the number one spot with Late Nights on Air jumping up a spot to number two. Late Nights on Air outsold M.J. Vassanji’s The Assassin’s Song for the first time since the Giller shortlist was announced on Tuesday, October 9, 2007.

Divisadero, the newest novel from Michael Ondaatje, has outpaced M.J. Vassanji’s The Assassin’s Song to become the sales leader in both the Scotiabank Giller finalists and the Governor-General Fiction award finalists this week. Divisadero’s sales increased by 83% after the Giller shortlist was announced and have increased again by almost 10% since the GG Fiction shortlist was revealed last week.

The five finalists for the 2007 Scotiabank Giller Prize have seen an average sales increase of 388% in the first week after the shortlist was announced, according to BookNet Canada’s BNC SalesData. In the week ending October 14, 2007, A Secret Between Us by Daniel Poliquin saw the highest percent increase at 1200%, followed by Effigy by Alyssa York with 564%.

Last year’s Scotiabank Giller Prize winner, Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures, saw a 464% increase in sales in the week following the announcement and remained in the Top 100 books for more than 7 months after the prize was awarded as tracked by BNC SalesData.

Every week, BNC SalesData provides valuable insight into the Canadian book market. Subscribers are telling us that these statistics are increasingly important to inform crucial business decisions and to measure previously elusive return-on-investment figures of specific campaigns.

Returns remain a constant challenge in the Canadian publishing industry as they allow retailers to take risks on books with uncertain demand even as they represent significant costs for publishers. Although each publisher, distributor or retailer certainly has a very clear view of their own returns, there is currently no industry-wide overview on the size, scale or impact of returns on the Canadian book market and so no way to create large-scale, cost-saving initiatives.

BookNet Canada is beginning a new pilot project, BNC DataSync, to test the possibilities of Global Data Synchronization Network (GDSN) information sharing for Canadian and U.S. publishers and general retailers. GDSN allows manufacturers and retailers to share timely product information through a global network of linked databases.