Two campaigns join forces to promote Quebec authors and give books to disadvantaged children montreal.ctvnews.ca - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from montreal.ctvnews.ca Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Collective online bookselling site Les Libraires went a long way toward helping Québec’s bookstores stay afloat in 2020, and bookstore owners say they now have new relationships with consumers. (Sponsored)
Librairie L’Exèdre co-owners Éliane Ste-Marie, left, and Audrey Martel
By Olivia Snaije | @OliviaSnaije
Working Together in Retail
In Québec, booksellers report doing increasingly better since 2015, with growth estimated at around 5 percent. But no one might have predicted that in 2020, total book sales would increase by 5.8 percent according to BTLF figures or that sales to the general public in independent bookstores would increase by 18 percent.
After all, during the first lockdown, which took place from mid-March to mid-May, independent bookstores saw their sales fall by an average of 63 percent. “In March I never thought I’d be saying this,” says Éric Simard, “but this has been our best year since 2015.”