Cookbooks, soufflé falls after Covid-19

“This is one of the ugliest covers of my entire career”admits Catherine Talec, director of Hachette Pratique. Without the slightest image, the series Very simple, by Jean-François Mallet, is nevertheless at the origin of one of the most spectacular hits in bookstores. Since 2015, available in around a hundred recipe books accessible to all, made with a maximum of six ingredients, this series has sold more than six million copies in France and internationally. “This chef, former major of the Ferrandi school, invented a method”details M^me Hostage : “Photos of each ingredient, because not everyone knows how to recognize dill for example, and on the right page a photo of the cooked dish. »

This year it was released before Christmas Ninja Airfryer Recipes (384 pages, 24.95 euros), a brand of oil-free fryer that has become “the” darling of the year, with which Hachette has entered into a partnership. The publisher has started its first print run at 80,000 copies… Remember that cookbooks – 970 new releases this year – sell like hotcakes as Christmas gifts since 40% of sales take place between October and the end of December.

The desire to cook small dishes peaked during the Covid-19 crisis, a blessed period for publishers since sales of cookbooks reached a historic peak of 121 million euros in 2021, according to the NielsenIQ institute GfK. The whole of France filled its libraries, but since then, the excitement has died down, and the enthusiasm has died down. According to Archchana Varatharajah, book consultant at NielsenIQ GfK, the market stood at €99 million in 2023, and sales in the first ten months of the year were down another 6% compared to the same period in 2023. Despite everything, a result that is significantly better than before the Covid-19 pandemic, notably due to the increase in book prices. This sector is distributed, she says, “between everyday cooking (44%), healthy and light cuisine (19%), world cuisine (18%), desserts and pastries (10%)” and other categories.

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