In an essay in the Independent Book Publishers Association’s monthly Independent magazine, Ingram content acquisition VP and IBPA board of directors member Kelly Gallagher showed why small and medium-sized publishers are “the industry’s healthiest and fastest-growing segment.”

The article noted that small publishers (the presses that need fewer than ten ISBNs every year year) have increased 69 percent between 2006 and 2011. Bowker now counts almost 21,000 of these scrappy publishers.

What do you think? Is this rapidly expanding segment the future of the publishing industry?

Read more

In a surprising report yesterday, the bibliographic company Bowker reported that 764,448 titles were released in 2009 that were outside of the company’s “traditional publishing and classification definitions”–a 181 percent increase compared to the year before.

According to the release, these nontraditional publishing titles consisted mainly of “largely on-demand titles produced by reprint houses specializing in public domain works and by presses catering to self-publishers and ‘micro-niche’ publications.” At the same time, the report noted that new titles and editions from traditional publishers actually declined from last year’s 289,729 in 2008 to an estimated 288,355 titles in 2009.

Here’s more from the report, including a quote from Bowker VP of publishing services Kelly Gallagher: “Now more than twice the output of traditional titles, the [print-on-demand] market is dominated by a handful of publishers. In fact, the top 10 publishers overall accounted for an astounding 74 percent of total titles produced in 2009. ‘Today, these companies are opening up new publishing venues by producing titles for very niche markets and also bringing public domain titles back to life. The net effect creates a long-tail that has no end,’ said Mr. Gallagher.”

Today Publishers Weekly had an excellent profile of BiblioBazaar, the company leading production in Bowker’s print-on-demand statistical report.

In a morning presentation at Digital Book World, Kelly Gallagher (pictured, via) of RR Bowker provided a preliminary look at the evolving e-readership.

Most dramatically, he reported that 37 percent of eBook readers earned over $65,000 a year, 38 percent earned between $35,000 and $75,000, and 25 percent earned $35,000 or below. That presents a considerable challenge for publishers–how to reach an economic bracket effectively priced out of the digital book market.

Associate editor Iris Blasi broke that figure down on Twitter: “100% of entry level publishing types live in the beige circle @BISG’s pie chart defines as “low income”(<$35K)."

In the survey's oddest result, eight percent of the respondents said they used nook, even though Nook wasn't released at the time of the survey. Gallagher blamed this on "brand confusion" in the world of digital readers.

Here's an excerpt from his speech: "Today all bets are off [about] knowing where that customer is. Today's consumer they don't care that we are here at this conference… that's a reality that's facing us in the publishing industry. All they care about that they're going to get their product when they want it and how they want it. They don't care what our problems are."