#BookTok Is Boosting Sales For Brick-And-Mortar Bookstores

TikTok’s crop of book lovers are boosting sales for Canada’s largest bookseller.

In its second-quarter earnings report, Indigo Books and Music Inc. said that #BookTok is having a noticeable positive effect on demand, especially for older titles.

Craig Louden, Indigo’s CFO, said #BookTok’s enthusiasm (and the billions of views the community generates) can generate a “new demand lifecycle” for backlist books, The Canadian Press reports.

Louden noted that Indigo specifically credits #BookTok’s young Gen Z users for driving enthusiasm for titles–in print, even, rather than ebook–that may otherwise have been lost in the constant crush of new books.

“This evolution of social commerce in the book space is exciting,” he said. “Not only does Indigo’s market leadership position benefit from the organic user generated content on BookTok, it sparks a sales resurgence for many previously released titles.”

Indigo CEO Heather Reisman added, “The popularity of reading on TikTok created a whole new level of reading excitement, particularly for teens.”

While this appears to be the first time Indigo has discussed #BookTok in an earnings call, it’s not the first nod the company has given TikTok’s rabid readers: Earlier this year, it launched a dedicated website section called “Now Trending on #BookTok,” which displays dozens of in-vogue titles and offers discounts on some of them.

Indigo reported $172 million in revenue for Q2 2021, a 27% year-over-year growth from the $135 million it made in Q2 2020.

Reisman said the revenue uptick is “beginning of a welcomed recovery in retail.”

Indigo, like many companies across North America, had to close all of its locations during stricter COVID-19 lockdowns, as it’s a nonessential business. It previously said it expected to suffer around a year of “damaging conditions” from the pandemic.