Future Book Forum 2022 reveals sustainable, profitable growth opportunities in print-on-demand at event hosted at Canon's Customer Experience Center in Germany, including how publishing industry needs to rethink supply chains, business models

May 27, 2022 (press release) –

Generating new growth while remaining sustainable and profitable was the central theme of this year’s Future Book Forum held by Canon Europe at its Customer Experience Center in Poing, Germany. On 4ᵗʰ and 5ᵗʰ May leading publishers, book producers, distributers and industry influencers gathered from across Europe to discuss ways to make the publishing industry fit for the future in terms of its environmental and financial health. And in case you missed it, we captured all of the best bits so you can now watch the content via our virtual experience platform.

Richard Charkin shares his insights into how the industry can grow more sustainably

Peter Kraus vom Cleff persuades delegates that now is the time for the industry to work together to achieve our climate goals

The interactive format of Future Book Forum gives experts the chance to exchange ideas

Now in its ninth year, the forum succeeded in bringing together representatives from every link of the publishing value chain. Thanks to the end of pandemic restrictions, this was the first time in two years that attendees were able to participate in person in two days of live presentations, workshops and networking opportunities to understand how they can achieve sustainable growth and enhance their enterprise value.

And because sessions from last year and this year’s Future Book Forum are being hosted on Canon’s virtual experience platform, anyone who missed it and is interested in the topics discussed, can now view the recorded presentations at their own convenience via the online portal.

Speaking about the success of Future Book Forum 2022 and the content that is now available to watch online, Peter Wolff, European Production, Direct Sales Vice President at Canon EMEA says, “With its impressive line-up of participants and session facilitators, we’ve had tremendous feedback from this year’s attendees. They’ve clearly benefitted from the face-to-face interaction and have left the event brimming with new ideas on how they can apply more sustainable practices to their own businesses, not only to make them more environmentally and socially responsible, but to make them more profitable.”

The event opened with a welcome from Peter Wolff, shortly followed by an address from the event’s moderator, global thought leader, author, futurist and speaker, Peter Fisk.

Future Book Forum 2022  keynote sessions on sustainability were delivered by a variety of experts from the publishing, marketing and consumer goods industries and are now available online; including:

• Matthias Rippel, Vice President Global Brand Strategy, Adidas delivered an inspirational speech drawing on the similarities between the publishing industry and the leading sports brand: both have the power to change lives and improve their communities. He shared insights on how the Adidas brand puts sustainability at the core of its growth strategy, using examples of how this is implemented in practice.
• Jemima Cox, Head of Social Sciences at the strategic consultancy, Canvas8, discussed consumers’ shifting attitudes towards sustainability, exploring emerging opportunities for businesses. She shared research on consumer behaviour and made recommendations of how the publishing industry can put the necessary changes into action.
• Richard Charkin, Publisher and former President of the International Publishers Association shared his views on how the publishing industry needs to think differently about supply chains, business models and accounting practices to become more sustainable and profitable. He takes a deep dive on the subject of digitisation and how print on demand can be used to improve sustainability of the publishing industry.
• To demonstrate how print service providers can take action, watch the video case study to discover how Elanders, a global Swedish-owned business specialising in print packaging and publishing, has migrated volume from offset to digital print to produce high volumes of shorter print runs, making production much more cost effective and sustainable.

The second day of the event kicked off with an address from Peter Kraus vom Cleff, MD of the German Publishers and Booksellers Association and President of the European Publishers’ Association (FEP) as he highlighted the importance of collaboration within the publishing industry to drive sustainability forward. He also spoke about how the industry needs to redefine growth and rethink industry practices. Considering that one in eight books purchased from bookstores are returned, he voiced how the industry needs to work together to make the whole supply chain more sustainable.

Delegates took part in a series of roundtable discussions in the form of the Innovation Lab. Inspired by the presentations on day one of the event, the participants had the opportunity to explore several topics centred around sustainability as a key driver for profitable growth which led to the generation of ideas that could be applied to the publishing industry to pave the way for its future success.

The event closed with a thought-provoking presentation from Andy Hunter, CEO and Founder of Bookshop.org. He urged the audience to collaborate more, broaden their scope and rethink their tried and tested ways of doing business as he shared his vision for a healthy and sustainable publishing industry. In his passionate address, he highlighted growth opportunities of sustainable business models, the need for the industry to share success and the importance of each player in the publishing ecosystem.

For free one-time registration and to view highlights of this year’s Future Book Forum, please visit: https://canon.sm/fbf2022online. The initial content from the event will be available from 26^th May 2022 with new content being added to the platform on a continual basis.

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