Bestsellers in numbers

I don't have such a list, but I wanted to respond to the second part of your question. You have to remember that the Canadian market is WAY smaller than the United States. Heck there are more people in California than in our entire country. Therefore a bestseller in Canada is going to have way lower numbers sold.

I know your last line was facetious, but I'll answer it honestly: Very. And 10 000? In Canada alone? I'll repeat . . . very.

(I look forward to the answer to the first half of your question though, I too am curious)

Toothpaste said:

Heck there are more people in California than in our entire country.

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I looked this up because I thought, "No, this can't be true."

It's true. By at least 3 million people.

No wonder housing is so expensive!

10,000 in Canada is huge. HUGE.

Speaking as someone with professional access to BookNet tracking numbers (and a book that hit the lists), 10,000 copies sold is a real rarity.

That being said, you won't find absolute numbers for bestseller status because that's not how it works -- it's a relative status, not an absolute one. IE, your ranking depends on where your sales for a finite period of time (usually a week) fit in relation to the sales of every other book during that period of time.

You can't say, for example, that selling 500 copies in Canada in a week will get you on the bestseller list -- if ten other books sell more than 500 copies, you're off the list. Similarly, sales of 3 copies in a week could make you a number one bestseller, so long as no other book sells more than two copies.

Does that make sense?

Edmontonian said:

Hello,

Is there any publication that lists bestsellers in numbers? And what numbers equal to the highly coveted title of bestseller? I have heard that in Canada, for fiction, 10,000 copies sold is considered a bestseller, but that seems so low. I mean how hard is it to storm the fiction market and sell a few thousand books?

ED

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BTW, if you're looking for Canadian publishing information, and details on sales, promotions, editorial, etc, you might want to read copies of Quill and Quire magazine. Lots of information to absorb, and it'll give you a good sense of who the players are (IE, the people you'll be dealing with).

I read on Tess Gerrittsen's blog that a Times Best Seller can be 5000 copies sold in one week, though it also has to do with what months books are released.

There's more about it here:

http://tessgerritsen.com/blog/2007/07/18/how-many-copies-sold-is-a-bestseller/

Quite an interesting read!

cheers
Sam

And MMPB is different from hardcover. You can sell 10,000 paperbacks and be nowhere near a bestseller list.