The invention of smartphones since the year 1992 has gradually evolved to a multifunctional purpose device aside its original intent of voice calls and text messages.
With the introduction of internet, readers are just a click away from purchasing online books or downloading them for free. This advance feature on mobile phones, has collapsed most of the traditional ways of book consumption.
Hardcopy books which may never go extinct because of it value however has seen a major decline in sales over the years with the introduction of online books.
Speaking to Emmanuel Erskine, a manager at a book shop with prolific books, he revealed that the challenges of a book shop business is as a result of the existence of online book.
“It’s a good business which comes with its challenges. With the advent of online books, people also prefer hard copy books.”
He adds that in peak season, where students purchase books for schools, business records gross sales on the daily.
” When school reopens, parents buy books for their wards, as well as ordinary people who wish to get a book to read. We make higher sales when students buy books for academic purposes.”
Meanwhile, Speaking to a cross section of Ghanaians who prefer online books over hard copy ones, they claim that accessibility and less cost are reasons why online books have become a preferred source.
” I prefer online books to hard one because, they come with dictionaries to check for words.”
