One of a publisher's jobs is to ensure that an author's book reaches as many people as possible. We achieve that through publicity, marketing campaigns and most importantly through visibility in retail environments. I classify (and I think most other people would do so too) these environments into independent book shops, chain book shops, libraries, supermarkets and the Internet. Each of these environments has its own characteristics in terms of type of customer, cost base, cost to service, range, and service levels. Each is important.

Publishers are frequently under attack for favouring one channel over another and of being short-sighted in allowing different prices to prevail in different sectors etc.

You only have to run a search on this blog for 'Keeble' and click to some of Clive's comments to get a sense of the debate. In essence, independent booksellers feel that large discounts granted by supermarkets rob them of sales of mass-market titles, large discounts granted by Internet booksellers rob them of sales of higher-priced 'quality' non-fiction sales, and large discounts granted by high-street chain booksellers rob them of everything else.

I recently checked out the UK sales of two recent best sellers. The first is a mass-market fiction title in paperback. The chains represented 50% of sales, supermarkets 35%, Internet 9%, independents 5% and libraries 1%(rounded up).

The second is a serious TV tie-in hardback non-fiction title. Chains were again 50%, Internet 30%, independents 11%, supermarkets 8% and libraries once more a little under 1%.

In making these calculations I assumed that the bulk of wholesalers' sales are to independents and I included small chains (a few outlets rather than scores or hundreds) in the independent sector. In other words, I don't think I have understated the independent share of the overall market for these books.

These numbers can be interpreted many ways and I'd welcome feedback. What it says to me is that the industry needs all these (and maybe other) channels. Certainly the independent market share is a concern but if we had not offered these books through the Internet and supermarkets (by not trading with them on acceptable-to-them terms) and, say, independent sales had doubled as a result (unlikely because neither of the titles would have made the best seller lists without supermarket and Internet data), our authors would still have been significantly worse off. The result of that would have been the loss of these authors in the future and consequent medium-term damage to our business. We have to find ways of creating a viable independent book shop sector but not by impeding other routes to market.

On a lighter note I am indebted to David Silverman for alerting us to this French version of Puff to sit alongside the book and CD we publish tomorrow. Enjoy.