Why Do Big 5 Publishers Dominate The Best-Seller Lists?

Not a news flash, but when it comes to printed adult books, the Big 5 dominate the best-seller lists. The Publishers Weekly best-seller lists for 2024 essentially were filled by mostly books from them. And within the top publishers circle, Penguin Random House clearly dominates.

Nearly 86 percent of all best-seller list slots went to books published by the Big 5. Penguin Random House took the majority of all spots for the entire year. The rest went to Harper Collins, Macmillan, Hachette, and Simon & Schuster.

Paperback slots were also dominated by one publisher — Sourcebooks, owned by Penguin Random House.

Seeing a pattern here? 90 percent of all adult paperback best-seller list spots for all of 2024 went to the Big Five and the majority went to Penguin Random House.

Why is that?

Are Big 5 better at securing the best books? Do they do something better than others when it comes to pricing, distribution, and/or marketing? Do authors only trust in the Big 5 to publish their books? Do consumers really care who published a particular book?

Maybe how sales are calculated and accounted for is what needs to be scrutinized. Indie authors must sell hundreds of millions of copies of their books, both digitally and in print, but how are they recognized by a system that favors the Big 5?

PW’s numbers are based on Circana BookScan, but that only captures 75-80 percent of all book sales, according to them. What about the rest?

The Big 5 is a powerhouse collective of published books with lots of resources to generate sales, but it is impressive that few publishers or indie authors are able to show up on best-seller lists. Is there a monopoly issue at play here?

Publications like PW are part of the reason the Big 5 remains on top. Much of their journalistic ink seems to be given to the Big 5. From articles and reviews, PW highlights the publishers that feed them with expensive ads, and sponsorships, and subscriptions. 

The Big 5 is in a financial position to take risks, publish unknown authors, and experiment with new types of marketing, though it does not do enough of any of that. The Big 5 is notorious for working hard to push its handful of A-list titles — and then to drain its hits with sequels, series, and spin-offs, just like Hollywood looks to milk its hits with sequels, spin-offs, and copy-cats. 

But once you get past the big best-sellers, the Big 5 has tens of thousands of books that were published with little fanfare. Most did not surpass 10,000 print units and a lot of their authors were not given a chance to have another book published with them.  

Don’t get me wrong, the Big 5 are very good at a lot of things and they are coveted for a reason: foreign rights, movie rights, international book sales, great editing/cover design/packaging, and decent distribution. But of all the many books that they publish, only a few hundred adult hardcover books and another few hundred adult paperbacks will fill the vast majority of the best-seller list spots.

Most books, even those of the Big 5, will flounder in mediocrity, even obscurity. 

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Brian Feinblum, the founder of this award-winning blog, with over four million page views, can be reached at brianfeinblum@gmail.com  He is available to help authors like you to promote your story, sell your book, and grow your brand. He has over 30 years of experience in successfully helping thousands of authors in all genres. Let him be your advocate, teacher, and motivator!

 

About Brian Feinblum

This award-winning blog has generated over four million pageviews. With 5,000+ posts over the past dozen years, it was named one of the best book marketing blogs by BookBaby  http://blog.bookbaby.com/2013/09/the-best-book-marketing-blogs  and recognized by Feedspot in 2021 and 2018 as one of the top book marketing blogs. It was also named by www.WinningWriters.com as a "best resource.”  Copyright 2025.

 

For the past three decades, Brian Feinblum has helped thousands of authors. He formed his own book publicity firm in 2020. Prior to that, for 21 years as the head of marketing for the nation’s largest book publicity firm, and as the director of publicity at two independent presses, Brian has worked with many first-time, self-published, authors of all genres, right along with best-selling authors and celebrities such as: Dr. Ruth, Mark Victor Hansen, Joseph Finder, Katherine Spurway, Neil Rackham, Harvey Mackay, Ken Blanchard, Stephen Covey, Warren Adler, Cindy Adams, Todd Duncan, Susan RoAne, John C. Maxwell, Jeff Foxworthy, Seth Godin, and Henry Winkler.

 

His writings are often featured in The Writer and IBPA’s The Independent (https://pubspot.ibpa-online.org/article/whats-needed-to-promote-a-book-successfully).

 

He hosted a panel on book publicity for Book Expo America several years ago, and has spoken at ASJA, BookCAMP, Independent Book Publishers Association Sarah Lawrence College, Nonfiction Writers Association, Cape Cod Writers Association, Willamette (Portland) Writers Association, APEX, Morgan James Publishing, and Connecticut Authors and Publishers Association. He served as a judge for the 2024 IBPA Book Awards.

 

His letters-to-the-editor have been published in The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, New York Post, NY Daily News, Newsday, The Journal News (Westchester) and The Washington Post. His first published book was The Florida Homeowner, Condo, & Co-Op Association Handbook.  It was featured in The Sun Sentinel and Miami Herald.

 

Born and raised in Brooklyn, he now resides in Westchester with his wife, two kids, and Ferris, a black lab rescue dog, and El Chapo, a pug rescue dog.

 

You can connect with him at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brianfeinblum/ or https://www.facebook.com/brian.feinblum