Online book sales outstrip offline in Covid-19’s wake

With the coronavirus pandemic prompting the growing popularity of ‘untact consumption’, South Korea’s publishing industry is seeing online book sales outstrip offline sales.

Kyobo Book Center, the No. 1 online and offline bookstore in South Korea, says that its book sales via mobile and web platforms this year comprised 33.4 percent and 22.9 percent, respectively, of total sales.

Offline sales, in contrast, remained at 43.7 percent. It is the first time that the bookstore’s online sales jumped ahead of offline sales.

Experts argue that the coronavirus outbreak has prompted consumers to purchase books through mobile or online platforms instead of visiting offline stores.

The coronavirus has also influenced book sale trends, in which sales of books related to science jumped by 46 percent while sales of publications on politics and society, economy and management jumped by 39.7 percent and 24.4 percent, respectively, compared to last year.

Most of the books involved how to deal with the coronavirus, and prospects in the post-pandemic world.

On the other hand, books on tourism plunged by 54.1 percent in sales, followed by magazines (-20.4 percent), cartoons (-10.6 percent), foreign books (-10.1 percent), poems and essays (-6.7 percent), and cookbooks (-5.3 percent).