Three-quarters of Russians prefer paper books

Three-quarters of Russians (76%) prefer paper books, a joint study of the chain of stores of low fixed prices Fix Price and the research holding "Romir" showed. At the same time, a third of respondents (34%) read from the screen of a tablet, smartphone or book reader, and another 7% do not see the difference between electronic and paper format (the question suggested several answers). Among men, the share of e-book readers was higher than among women - 40% and 32%, respectively.

As for the regularity of reading books, 42% of Russians answered that they read from time to time, 35% - rarely, and 23% - often. Residents of Moscow and the Central Federal District turned out to be the most reading (among them 29% and 27% read "often", respectively), and residents of the Ural and Volga Federal districts most often do not have enough time to read (among them 13% and 14% read books "often", respectively). In St. Petersburg, 22% of respondents reported reading books regularly.

Interestingly, the factor of having children has a direct impact on reading books. So, among those who do not have children, 30% "often" read, when one child appears, 24% often read, the second – 13%, three or more - 6%. From the point of view of social status, it was expected that students would be the most reading (persons under the age of 18 did not participate in the survey). And from the point of view of professional affiliation, lawyers, marketers and PR specialists, designers and personnel management specialists turned out to be the most reading.

The top 3 favorite genres of literature of Russians included detectives (39%), adventures (29%) and historical novels (24%). At the same time, women have detective stories and romance novels in the top, but most men read detective stories and fantasy. The least Russians read poetry (5%) and literature in a foreign language (3%). The answers showed that on average, the majority of respondents (34%) read from 1 to 3 books a year, and only 16% of respondents read more than 10 books.

"A book is one of the most inexpensive hobbies available to almost everyone. Despite the fact that at some life stages the interest in reading fades into the background, the love of books and the desire to read are undoubtedly characteristic of most of our compatriots. The range of Fix Price stores is constantly updated with new books and bestsellers that are available in our low price segments. In addition, the topic of "books" is close to us within the framework of corporate social responsibility – for example, we conduct campaigns to collect books in favor of rural libraries," Ekaterina Goncharova, Director of Communications at Fix Price.

The majority of respondents answered that they prefer to read at home (74%), the second most popular answer is during a vacation in the country or at a resort (45%), and 31% of Russians like to read on public transport.

"Today it is very important that retailers allow the buyer to close not only the basic shopping cart, but also offer additional solutions. Reading remains quite an important way of spending time for Russians, and the presence in the assortment matrix of those positions that will cover such a need as a hobby will help form a loyal core of the customer audience," Anastasia Sidorina, Director of Customer Relations at Romir.