outlook for local publishers is bleak

The opening paragraphs of an article in Wellington's Dominion Post newspaper by a journalist named Diana Dekker from about a week ago read like this:

"Publish and be damned takes on a whole different meaning in Wellington where a string of small independent publishers turn out superb books with very little chance of a fortune from them.
"The big, international publishers - Penguin, Random, Harper Collins, Macmillan - are all based in Auckland, their overheads large but their incomes cushioned by overseas blockbusters.
"In Wellington, shoestring publishing operations turn out successful books from New Zealanders for New Zealanders, all with dedication and the hope that something might make it big internationally and pay for the intellectual indulgences of several years past.
"Pride, enthusiasm - they practically resonate from the people who run publishing houses such as Awa, Steele Robertson, Bridget Williams Books, Huia, Victoria University Press, Gecko and Phantom."

She omitted to mention us and a few others, and misspelt one she did mention. She also failed to mention that her newspaper, owned by Fairfax, cares little for local books and the only chance you have of getting a review in it is if you know the right person there. 

Did she get other facts right? Well, Macmillan gave away local publishing some time ago, and her definition of "successful" is left unspecified.  If she means artistically successful, then yes, if she means financially then no (unless the authors pay for it all as in the case of Steele Roberts).  

Print runs have steadily fallen over the years. When we started in the mid-1980s, 3,000 copies was the typical run for a New Zealand non-fiction title, now it is more like 2,000 and margins on that quantity are tight, provided you sell them all undiscounted.  With the Whitcoulls/Borders/Bennetts chain out of the picture there are only about 40 good independent bookstores in the country plus about a dozen Paper Pluses run by people interested in books. Most of them ought to be able to shift 40-50 copies of a local title, but their typical opening order will be 10 with re-orders of 2 or 3 at a time, and those restocks will get displayed spine out on a side shelf, often in the wrong category. Victoria University Press's typical print run in the 1990s was 1,500 and it's probably lower now.  Fine academic works maybe, but we'd hate to rep their titles to stores; most store buyer responses would be "we know how to get one if somebody orders it".

Fortunately there are outlets other than the 50 or so high street bookstores. There are a few specialist library suppliers and although copies in libraries will hurt fiction sales, they actually help non-fiction, particularly pictorial non-fiction. Most of our books in NZ are sold through museums and visitor centres.  But the picture on the horizon is bleak.  Those small local publishers who stick with it won't be doing so for money.