Brill posts increased profits for 2009
Medieval History

Brill posts increased profits for 2009


The academic publisher Brill earned ?2.1 million in profit in the last year, which they attribute to lower operational costs and strong sales of its online products. The Dutch based publisher is one of the largest publishers of academic materials in the field of medieval studies.

In a press release, Brill said they had a "solid performance in 2009" with ?26.1 million in revenue, compared to ?25.7 the previous year. In 2008, Brill only had a profit of ?0.2 million.

While sales of print books decline by 4% in 2009, electronic materials increased by 34% over the year, and now makes up 21% of total sales. The publisher said in their report that while the number of books they are printing has remained stable, "less favorable expectations for new books forced the company to scrutinize new projects and implement policies to use printing on demand and reduce inventory. Special focus was on the sale of electronic books, foremost in the context of subject collections."

Brill expects to continue to grow its collection of reference works, such as the Encyclopaedia of Islam and its 135 journals, which include Medieval Encounters and Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient. They hope that their efforts on putting more and more content in electronic form will keep the company healthy if print sales continue to fall.

The report also notes that "during the year the painful decision was made to reduce headcount by ten percent and implement cost cutting measures in light of disappointing sales. Thanks to the flexible and constructive attitude of its employees the organization has successfully met its strategic and operational goals and returned to solid profitability."

They believe that they will remain profitable in 2010, but add "the financial and economic crisis for the library market globally is still hard to predict."

Brill, which based in Leiden, Netherlands, celebrated its 325th anniversary in 2008. It has been one of the most important publishers of medieval studies books for several decades, producing dozens of volumes each year.

Click here to read their press release with more details about their performance in 2009.





- American Historical Association: Openings And New Phds On The Rise: The 2012 Jobs Report
The number of job openings advertised with the AHA in the 2011?12 academic year increased by 18 percent over the year before?rising for the second time in a row. Unfortunately, other evidence shows the competition for academic positions also continued...

- Slaves Or Not, Babylonians Were Much Like Us, Says Book
They got married, had children, made beer. Although they lived 3,500 years ago in Nippur, Babylonia, in many ways they seem like us. Whether they were also slaves is a hotly contested question which Jonathan Tenney, assistant professor of ancient Near...

- Scholarship On Ancient And Medieval Middle East Becomes Free Digitally
A wealth of material that documents the ancient Middle East has become available through a new, free online service at the Oriental Institute. ¨ The material comes from the extensive collection at the institute, which is a major publisher of important...

- The New Schoenberg Database Of Manuscripts
The University of Pennsylvania Libraries is pleased to announce the launch of the new Schoenberg Database of Manuscripts. Since early November, a new search interface has been available in beta version for testing. Thanks to feedback from users, we have...

- Gorgias Press Book Sale
In honor of our recent move, we are having an unbelievable moving sale for ALL online orders. For a limited time only all online orders will receive a 40% discount through BiblioPerksTM. In addition, every tenth customer that takes advantage of this limited...



Medieval History








.