ROME - Over 90% of Italian bookstores "affected" by the Covid emergency, with a worsening of the economic performance of its business precisely because of the pandemic, and over 84% in difficulty in meeting their financial needs, such as pay employees, provide bills and rents, bear contribution and tax charges. This is the alarm launched by the first Ali Confcommercio Observatory, in collaboration with the Demoscopic Format Research Institute, on bookstores in Italy, presented today at the 76th Assembly of the Italian Booksellers Association.
"According to our estimates - the president of Ali Confcommercio, Paolo Ambrosini increases the dose - in the period March-April there are no less than 140 million of lower turnover, equal to about 45 million euros of lost gross profits. A very heavy boulder", he says , which weighs heavily on the 3,670 bookstores counted by the Observatory (231 fewer in the last five years) and their 11,000 employees. With Lazio, Lombardy and Piedmont first in number of establishments (25% are in the North West, 18% in the North East, 26% in the Center and 31% in the South). In this lockdown, he recalls, the president of Confcommercio Carlo Sangalli, "were recognized among the services that could reopen early in April. An important step, even if not exhaustive. Between reopening and resisting - he underlines - a big difference passes. The moment is indeed very delicate and the risk of the perfect storm must be avoided: on the one hand, the heavy costs of phase 2 and the few entrances, on the other a liquidity crisis that persists and worsens and which requires that the measures provided for by the decree recovery are implemented as soon as possible. There is a dramatic theme of economic and social stability in the immediate and near future ".
The toughest moment of the post-Covid crisis, the report said, is in fact close to summer: over 70% of bookstores have adopted layoffs and 60% have reduced or plan to reduce their staff, with a drop already recorded between December 2019 and April 2020 of -6.6% and a forecast for July 2020 of -18%. The lockdown period, the lost profits, the absence of non-refundable contributions have caused a very serious lack of liquidity without which many risk closure (indicator -30.6 points compared to the previous period). Only 8.4% of independent bookstores have asked for credit in recent months, 72.7% obtaining a positive response. "The data presented confirm all the fragility of Italian bookstores, but also the great opportunities that our businesses have before them", adds Ambrosini. If there is a positive note of these months, it has been the discovery of new ways of selling. If 22% of bookstores in Italy have a website and 53% have a social page or a showcase on the main marketplaces, in these closing months and limitations 27% have started to use or have intensified the use of electronic commerce ( 3 out of 10 have also implemented home delivery) and 86.1% of them believe that the solutions adopted during the pandemic could become permanent. But e-commerce competition and the absence of market regulation remains a problem for 66.1% of the sector. Not to mention that 62.8% of bookstores declare that even before the lockdown they were unable to make available an updated assortment to customers.
"What emerged in the weeks of crisis - comments Ambrosini - is that there can be no book market without bookstores and booksellers and that bookstores alone cannot face the market, a world in continuous and rapid transformation, or manage the complicated relationship with publishers ". Among the requests of Ali Confcommercio therefore, an extraordinary national plan for the opening of bookstores, support for demand by extending and strengthening the 18app, tax deduction for books, "same market same rules" with the big digital competitors, contrast to reprography illegal and improper use of digital copies, tax credit extended to all bookstores.
