On April 25 those same Big-6 publishers collectively had 13 titles on the same list.
Big Publisher share of the Kindle Romance bestseller list fell 50% from 27 to 13 titles in roughly eight weeks.
In that same period the same group went from 39 titles to 19 titles on the Nook Romance Bestseller List. More titles but the same 50% drop.
So that seems to be the industry-wide trend...but what are the differences between the retailers?
Well for one thing, we see that Amazon has about half as much Agency Publisher share as B&N. What's more interesting is the distribution of agency titles across the list.
Today (4/25) there are 8 agency titles in the top-20 Nook slots. Nearly half of the agency titles on the list are in the top-20, making it pretty top-heavy. Top 20 slots in Kindle Romance? Two agency titles.
Chart 1: Price of top 20 books on Kindle and Nook Romance lists - 4/25/11
The average price of the entire lists are pretty similar ($4.13 for Kindle vs. $4.17 for Nook) but the premium-priced titles just can't crack the top of the Kindle list. If fact, there are 12 titles in what we call the discount price band ($0-$2.99) compared to none on the Nook list. That is probably the biggest takeaway from this analysis.
Kindle Romance is increasingly dominated by low-cost ebooks under $3. The trend has been strongly downward all of 2011 and shows no signs of reversing. Barring seasonal changes, it appears that premium Romance titles are going to be harder and harder to place on the list - certainly at the top. This is one of the most glaring differences in consumer behavior between Kindle and Nook but it's not the only one.
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