Book Buying Analysis 2019

This is the third year running i’ve kept track of the books I buy, to throw all the data into a spreadsheet, make a pretty graph, and talk about how much money I spend on how many books from what places. I just find it interesting, okay? Previous years can be found here.

Other than one spectacular anomaly (which I’ll get to later), my two biggest spenders remain unchanged: Page 45 and Wordery. I’m nothing if not a faithful customer, apparently. But not to Waterstones this year—I didn’t buy a single book from them! I’m lumping all charity shops together this year, as there was no singular stand-out shop. Five Leaves, a local bookshop, and Troutmark, in Cardiff, both make a reappearance after being missing in 2018. At the Sign of the Dragon is a science fiction shop in Wigtown, which I could have spent hours longer in. And Stella and Rose Books… my anomaly.

Here are the numbers:

At the Sign of the Dragon
Total number of books bought: 8
Total cost: £30.99
Average price per book: £3.87

Charity
Total number of books bought: 10
Total cost: £23.97
Average price per book: £2.40

Five Leaves
Total number of books bought: 3
Total cost: £27.98
Average price per book: £9.33

Page 45
Total number of books bought: 7
Total cost: £79.93
Average price per book: £11.42

Stella Books
Total number of books bought: 3
Total cost: £80.00
Average price per book: £26.67

Troutmark
Total number of books bought: 3
Total cost: £10.50
Average price per book: £3.50

Wordery
Total number of books bought: 6
Total cost: £52.48
Average price per book: £8.75

Cumulatively, this is the damage:

2019 Totals:
Total number of books bought: 40
Total cost: £305.85
Average price per book: £7.65

And visually, we’re looking at this masterpiece of a bar chart:

Let’s start by addressing the anomaly in the room. I spent £80.00 on three books. This has skewed these numbers a bit, but oh well. I bought the Folio Society John Wyndham editions. Secondhand, because the Folio Society isn’t printing any more copies. So technically a ‘rare book’ purchase—my first, in fact. I regret nothing. This tipped November into my highest spend month, when in the previous two years I haven’t spent anything in November.

Expensive anomaly aside, October was my most active month, when I spent almost £78 on eight books. The two main shops I bought from were Page 45 and Five Leaves, both local independent bookshops who I am happy to support. I didn’t spend anything in the first two months of the year. Which differs hugely from the last two years, where both months were pretty big spending months. But I made up for it in March, with £45.47 spent in the second busiest month (discounting The Anomaly). And I was too busy enjoying the nice weather in June and July to buy any books, apparently.

Although Page 45 was were I spent a high chunk of money, on average the cost of each book was £11.42. That’s an improvement from last year’s average Page 45 book price of £15.99, but not quite as good as 2017’s £10.79. My average book price at Wordery is only going up: £7.91 in 2017, £8.51 in 2018, and now £8.75 in 2019. As a more reputable competitor to Amazon with free world wide shipping on all books, i’m more than happy with those numbers.

Objectively, May was by far and away my best month. I bought the most books (12), but spent the least per book on average (£3.15). Once again not including The Anomaly, my monthly averages aren’t bad, with April being the worst, where I bought two books, spending an average of £12.90 per book (two totally-worth it books—I just went to check what they were!).

Even with The Anomaly, my overall yearly spent was less than the two years previously. So i’m pretty chuffed with that. But I did buy my lowest number of books—only 40 compared to 2018’s 58 and 2017’s 46. And that’s pushed the average price per book to the highest in the last three years at £7.65.

Looking at the books I got, I think on the whole I bought with more purpose this year. I chose books I genuinely wanted, mostly from independent shops, by under-represented authors, and on interesting and important topics. Plus a whole bunch of cheap, incredible, secondhand science fiction. Oh, and those rare John Wyndhams. I may not have read every book I bought in 2019 yet, but I can safely say I regret none of them.

This analysis thing is getting interesting. The only consistent similarities are the places I spend the most money, and December being a no-buy month. Otherwise I feel like I’m a bit of a wildcard with my book buying habits. And I’m okay with that. Let’s see what my 2020 book buying brings… can I bring in my total cost at under £300? Will I buy another set of expensive rare books? Could I discover a new favourite bookshop? See you next year to find out!

Book Buying Analysis 2018

In 2017 I kept track of all the books I bought, and at the end of the year I compiled all the data and wrote a post about it. Well, it should be no surprise that in 2018 I kept hold of all the receipts, all the confirmation emails, and all the delivery slips for every book I purchased so I could do the same thing all over again. What’s a bit of analysis if you can’t compare at least two sets of year end data?

Thankfully I still had the spreadsheet my more numbers-minded partner created last year, so it was fairly easy to input the new figures and extract the important data. The graph proved a pain in the proverbial, but it came together in the end, and no number crunching is truly complete without a pretty picture of it.

And so, the numbers.

My three top suppliers remain unchanged: Page 45, Waterstones, and Wordery. The only others I really thought worth mentioning were Abe Books, where I bought 5 secondhand books; Story Bundle, where a particular theme might catch my interest now and again; and three UK cities, where I visited a bunch of independent bookshops (Brighton, Cardiff, and Edinburgh). Laid out, here’s the damage:

Abe Books:
Total number of books bought: 5
Total cost: £14.41
Average price per book: £2.88

Independent Brighton:
Total number of books bought: 2
Total cost: £12.99
Average price per book: £6.50

Independent Cardiff:
Total number of books bought: 3
Total cost: £13.50
Average price per book: £4.50

Independent Edinburgh:
Total number of books bought: 7
Total cost: £63.46
Average price per book: £9.07

Page 45:
Total number of books bought: 6
Total cost: £95.93
Average price per book: £15.99

Story Bundle:
Total number of books bought: 10
Total cost: £11.20
Average price per book: £1.12

Waterstones:
Total number of books bought: 4
Total cost: £38.96
Average price per book: £9.74

Wordery:
Total number of books bought: 10
Total cost: £85.10
Average price per book: £8.51

And including the few other places I bought an odd book, the 2018 totals look like this:

2018 Totals:
Total number of books bought: 58
Total cost: £366.48
Average price per book: £6.32

But numbers are meaningless without colourful graphs, so let’s show off the hard work I put into this one:

For reasons I cannot fathom, July was my busiest book-buying month, with £115.78 spent on 17 books, though at an average of £6.81 a book, that’s not too bad, right? February, May, and October are close on July’s heels with £76.35, £61.85, and £53.97 spent respectively. Perhaps one of the best months, objectively, was March, with £24.19 spent on 12 books, which makes an average of £2.02 a book!

The most books I bought from one supplier was a tie between Story Bundle and Wordery, with 10 from each. But with average book costs of £1.12 and £8.51 respectively, Story Bundle was by far a better deal! Just like last year, Page 45 is my biggest wallet drainer, with £95.93 spent on 6 books, making them a whopping £15.99 each on average. As an independent store selling top quality and high priced graphic novels, Page 45 will always be my biggest spend—and I have no regrets about that.

Let’s do a little compare and contrast with 2017.

My average monthly spend was £30.54. More than last year’s £26.88, but I did spend £44 extra and bought 12 more books than in 2017… so things were always going to look worse.

In 2017 my busiest book buying month was far and away January, where I spent over double compared to any other month. July has been the busiest month in 2018, but without that runaway lead… and I barely spent £20 in January. Considering I spent more money on more books in 2018, there are also more months where I didn’t buy any books at all. Five whole months where not a single book came into my possession, compared to only two in 2017. The one thing that stands out clearly, though, is that in both years November and December are no-go months for book buying. I could speculate that this is because I’m too busy buying books as christmas presents, or not wanting to disturb my wishlist ahead of christmas… but I honestly don’t know why.

As fun and interesting as this is, I still haven’t spotted any real trends or patterns yet. Oh well, let’s see how 2019 goes…

Book Buying Analysis 2017

Last year I loved reading the analysis on the year’s book buying that Rachel over at Confessions of a Book Geek put together. I found it really interesting to lay it all out, see how much was spent at each shop and what the average price per book was. I liked it so much so, I decided to keep track of my own book buying habits in 2017.

I kept all my receipts, and even wrote out little notes for books bought online. At the start of this year I attempted to throw them all into a spreadsheet and do some magic calculations. Turns out I’m rubbish at that, and my abysmal attempt offended my accountant partner so much he took my receipts and did it all for me!

I have four main book suppliers: Wordery, Waterstones, Oxfam bookshops, and a local comic book shop called Page 45. Other bookshops I spent my hard-earned money at this year was another local called Five Leaves Bookshop, Scarthin Books in Cromford, and Troutmark Books in Cardiff. So let’s break it down:

Wordery:
Total number of books bought: 6
Total cost: £47.44
Average price per book: £7.91

Waterstones:
Total number of books bought: 7
Total cost: £69.93
Average price per book: £9.99

Oxfam:
Total number of books bought: 14
Total cost: £33.36
Average price per book: £2.38

Page 45:
Total number of books bought: 10
Total cost: £107.89
Average price per book: £10.79

Five Leaves:
Total number of books bought: 3
Total cost: £29.93
Average price per book: £9.98

Scarthin:
Total number of books bought: 3
Total cost: £19.97
Average price per book: £6.66

Troutmark:
Total number of books bought: 1
Total cost: £2.50
Average price per book: £2.50

If that wasn’t bad enough, when we put it all together, it looks worse:

2017 Totals:
Total number of books bought: 46
Total cost: £322.52
Average price per book: £7.01

Let’s make this information more aesthetically pleasing–and less number-y–by looking at it in graph form:

Taking it monthly, January was by far my most active book-buying month, with 11 books bought and £92.84 spent. The other months don’t compare, with all of them remaining between 2 and 8 books bought, and never breaching £40.00 spent. And by the end of the year I’d stopped completely, buying no books in November or December! So, er, can I blame the worst of it on a post-Christmas, new-year frenzy?

Spreading the load, overall my average monthly spend was £26.88, which doesn’t sound so bad. I’m going to focus on that number.

With all the prices in one place, it’s a bit hard to comprehend how I spent so much. But it’s also easy to see how I managed it. I bought the highest number of 14 books from Oxfam, but only spent £33 there in the whole year. Whereas I bought half as many books from Waterstones, but managed to spend almost £70! The priciest place, unsurprisingly, was Page 45, with an average cost of just under £11 per book. As an independent bookshop selling comics and graphic novels, the cost of their books are generally on the higher end of the scale anyway. Pair that with the fact I get a little giddy every time I step foot in there and rarely leave without buying something and it’s easy to see why that shop alone counts for an entire third of my yearly spend.

I don’t really have any take away from this, other than the fact it was interesting to see it all broken down this way. I’ve realised I favour buying books I genuinely want from more reputable and ethical places over the thrill of a bargain, and I find myself grateful that I’m in a position to do that.

I have yet to spend a penny on books in 2018, but now I’m in the habit, I’m sure I’ll find myself squirrelling away my receipts to do all of this again next year!