While the literary industry as a whole is flat this year, Bible sales are red hot.
A series of anxiety-inducing events, from elections to inflation to international conflicts, has driven more and more people to buy a book that is at the heart of Christianity. Overall, sales this year were up 22% by the end of October, according to Circana BookScan.
Many of these customers are first-time customers, an interesting statistic, as an increasing number of Americans say they profess no religious affiliation. AND A study by Pew Research found that 28% of the country described themselves as atheist, agnostic or “nothing in particular” when asked about their religion.
Despite this, Bible sales have been on the rise for some time. In 2019, Americans bought 9.7 million Bibles. Last year, that number jumped to 14.2 million. And in the first 10 months of this year, the figure has already reached 13.7 million.
By the way, this total does not include the so-called Donald Trump’s Biblewho includes song lyrics at Lee Greenwood’s God bless USA and a copy of the Constitution. Nor copies of other religious texts, including the Koran or the Hebrew Bible.
One Bible publisher said The Wall Street Journal experienced a wave of interest from Generation Z and younger Americans. There are over 8 million Bible posts on TikTok, as well as tons of Bible videos for purchase, many of which have hundreds of thousands or even over a million likes.
Booksellers say demand is coming from both the spiritually curious and people who already own one or more and want to expand their collection. And sales are on the rise not only at Christian stores, but at mainstream retailers as well Amazon.
