Amazon says sales of e-books outstrip hardbacks and paperbacks by 2-1
Online retail giant Amazon has revealed that customers are choosing e-books over hardcover books at a rate of more than 2 to 1, even as hardcover sales continue to grow.
Since April 1, Amazon said it sold 105 books for its Kindle e-reader for every 100 hardcover and paperback books sold, including books without Kindle versions. Free Kindle books were excluded and, if included, would make the number even higher, Amazon said.
Gordon Willoughby, european director at Kindle commented: “Amazon.co.uk customers are choosing Kindle books more often than hardcovers at a rate of more than 2 to 1. This is truly astonishing when you consider that we’ve been selling hardcover books from Amazon.co.uk for over 13 years and Kindle books for only nine months.”
Over 650,000 books are now available to purchase from the UK Kindle Store. Bestselling titles in 2011 have included ‘The Basement’ by Stephen Leather, ‘The Hanging Shed’ by Gordon Ferris and ‘The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’ by Stieg Larsson.
