Earlier this year, our Tech Forum webinar Emerging trends: Book subjects on the move in the Canadian market revealed that sales of botany titles went up 1,757% from 2020 to 2021. We previously discussed how houseplant culture has grown in popularity over the last few years and pandemic gardening further increased that popularity. Following that surge, there's every indication that the growing interest in gardening is here to stay but what does the data say about Canadian book consumers and gardening?
In our Subject spotlight series, we're sharing quarterly data-driven insights into a specific corner of the Canadian book market. Below, we’ll take a look at the sales and library circulation of Gardening titles in the second quarter of 2022, with the help of our SalesData and LibraryData services.
Buying Gardening titles
Canadian book buyers' interest in Gardening titles dropped in the second quarter of 2022. Compared to 2021, the overall sales of Gardening titles were down 16% over the entire quarter. From April to June 2022, sales of Gardening titles decreased by 9% compared to 2021 when sales dropped by 32%.
The second quarter of 2022 saw increases year-over-year in some of the Gardening BISAC subcategories, especially:
Non-Fiction / Gardening / Shrubs — up 459%;
Non-Fiction / Gardening / Garden Furnishings — up 300%; and
Non-Fiction / Gardening / Climatic — up 250%.
From April to June 2022, the most purchased Gardening subcategories were:
Non-Fiction / Gardening / Vegetables — 19% of all Gardening titles sales;
Non-Fiction / Gardening / Herbs — 10% of all Gardening titles sales; and
Non-Fiction / Gardening / Organic — 9% of all Gardening titles sales.
Borrowing Gardening titles
Overall, year-over-year loans increased by 32% and renewals increased by 39%. In the entire second quarter of 2022, loans decreased by 14%. Renewals for Gardening from April to July 2022 increased by 18%. The second quarter of 2021 was different for the library circulation of Gardening titles. Over this quarter, loans steadily decreased by 33% from April to June and renewals decreased by 39%.
Which Gardening BISAC subcategories were the most popular in Canadian libraries? From April to July 2022, these subcategories saw the greatest increases in library circulation compared to 2021:
Non-Fiction / Gardening / Hydroponics — loans up 200% and renewals up 100%;
Non-Fiction / Gardening / Shrubs — loans up 101% and renewals up 103%; and
Non-Fiction / Gardening / Climatic — loans up 74% and renewals up 87%.
During the second quarter of 2022, the most circulated Gardening subcategories were:
Non-Fiction / Gardening / Vegetables — 15% of all Gardening titles loans and 17% of all Gardening titles renewals;
Non-Fiction / Gardening / Garden Design —11% of all Gardening titles loans and 10% of all Gardening titles renewals; and
Non-Fiction / Gardening / General — 9% of all Gardening titles loans and 9% of all Gardening titles renewals.
Reading Gardening titles
Top borrowed
Grow More Food by Colin McCrate and Brad Halm
All New Square Foot Gardening, 3rd Edition, Fully Updated by Mel Bartholomew
Grow Now by Emily Murphy
Niki Jabbour's Veggie Garden Remix by Niki Jabbour 🍁
The Complete Gardener by Monty Don
Top selling
The Old Farmer's Almanac Vegetable Gardener's Handbook by The Old Farmer’s Almanac
Rosemary Gladstar's Medicinal Herbs: A Beginner's Guide by Rosemary Gladstar
The Year-Round Vegetable Gardener by Niki Jabbour 🍁
The Healing Garden by Juliet Blankespoor
Floret Farm's Cut Flower Garden: Grow, Harvest, and Arrange Stunning Seasonal Blooms by Erin Benzakein and Julie Chai
Stay tuned for future instalments of this series or sign up to our eNews for more digestible data on the Canadian book market.
Until next time!
You can easily request advance reading copies (ARCs) on CataList.