From the press release:
Kobo, the only pure-play global eReading service built on an open platform, today revealed its Holiday 2010 momentum. This Christmas, readers around the world received new eReaders and iPads and other eReading devices under their tree. Over a million people connected to Kobo, and hundreds of thousands of devices were activated each day since Christmas Eve, fuelling the highest eBook download rate in the company’s history. People around the world chose Kobo this Christmas, with the popular easy-to-use Kobo Wireless eReader, dozens of compatible eReaders, top-rated applications for iPad, iPhone, Blackberry, Android, and one of the largest catalogues in the world with over 2.2 million eBooks, newspapers and magazines.
“Earlier this month we predicted that Christmas would be a record breaker for Kobo, and we have exceeded our expectations driving several ebook downloads per second since Christmas Eve, or an equivalent number hardcover books stacked as high as 50 Empire State Buildings ” said Michael Serbinis, CEO of Kobo. “I would like to thank our customers for choosing Kobo to start building their digital library this Christmas. Our success this holiday season is a pre-cursor to a New Year with people reading more than ever thanks to eBooks and Kobo.”
Kobo’s holiday growth also included:
· Total registered users nearly doubling from the six weeks prior
· A 50X increase in purchases from previous Holiday weekend last year
· A 5X increase in purchases from the previous biggest weekend (also in December)
· Customer purchases from over 130 countries, with some of the biggest gains outside of US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, UK, occurring in Germany, Netherlands, and Singapore
· A significant increase in device mix, with eReaders and Tablets accounting for the largest percent in sales
Kobo became the first eReading service to launch an eBook gifting and gift card program and for the first time in history, eBooks “arrived” digitally in people’s email accounts this Christmas morning. The top three most popular eBooks gifted this holiday were:
· “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo” by Stieg Larsson· “The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest” by Stieg Larsson
· “Room” by Emma Donahue
…Top three Kobo eBook title sales by country:
Canada
1. “The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest” by Stieg Larsson2. “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” by Stieg Larsson
3. “Room” by Emma Donahue
United States
1. “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” by Stieg Larsson2. “The Girl Who Played With Fire” by Stieg Larsson
3. “The Lost Symbol” by Dan Brown
United Kingdom
1. “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” by Stieg Larsson2. “The Confession” James E. Mcgreevey
3. “The Girl Who Played With Fire” by Stieg Larsson
Australia
1. “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” by Stieg Larsson2. “The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets’ Nest” by Stieg Larsson
3. “The Girl Who Played With Fire” by Stieg Larsson
Rest Of World
1. “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” by Stieg Larsson2. “Dead Or Alive” by Tom Clancy
3. “The 4-Hour Body” by Timothy Ferriss
With all that growth maybe they can afford to provide better customer service in their ebook store.
@Brian – not a chance. Well, unless they actually take the radical step of opening their own CS department (Kobo’s current customer disservice is outsourced to a quite toxic cubicle-farm that started life as a telemarketing company).
Interesting, didn’t know it was outsourced. My issue has been open since September and I’ve even been in contact with Michael Tamblyn their VP in charge of content who was going to “look into this” and get back to me (over a month ago) so I’m not sure if bringing things in house would make it better or not.
To be fair they did offer a refund, but I’d rather have them fix the problem and get a process in place so it’s easier to get similar things handled for future customers. As it is they’re still selling the titles in issue even though they know there are problems.