The consultation process – and whether the royalty floor survives intact – will decide the shape of a market of growing continental significance.

The proposal

Poland’s draft Act on the Protection of the Book Market would fix retail prices for new books during their first 12 months on sale, cap wholesale distribution discounts at 45%, create a national sales-reporting system and guarantee minimum royalties of 10% of cover price for authors (3% for translators).

The Ministry of Culture argues the rules would shield independent bookshops from dominant chains; 14 industry organisations have demanded publication of the full text before a promised vote around March 2027.

Publishers push back

On 22 October, houses including Znak, Rebis, Muza and Helion launched the campaign “Nie podnoście Polakom cen książek” (“Don’t Raise Book Prices for Poles”), arguing that uniform pricing would raise reader prices and could keep new e-books and audiobooks off subscription services for a year. NielsenIQ BookData shows print unit sales fell 11.3% year-on-year in the first half of 2026.

The ministry has dismissed the campaign as misinformation; the Book Publishers Association (PWK) rejected that charge on 29 October, insisting its members are small and medium-sized houses.

A decade in the making

The dispute has deep roots. Poland’s first draft pricing bill dates to 2017, and the Polish Book Chamber (PIK) later tabled a 2021 proposal fixing prices for 12 months with discounts capped at 5%.

In December 2025 the Culture Ministry announced it would incorporate Book Market Roundtable recommendations into legislation.

A February 2026 simulation by Warsaw School of Economics professor Michał Bernardelli, drawing on NielsenIQ data covering roughly 40% of the market, concluded fixed prices would level the playing field; PWK questioned the data. In July 2026, the competition watchdog UOKiK warned the bill could damage market competition.

The European context

Poland would join around 13 European states with fixed book prices, including Germany (a tradition dating to 1888, given statutory force in 2002) and France (the 1981 loi Lang). The UK’s Net Book Agreement, by contrast, collapsed in 1995.

Concentration drives the Polish case: between 2010 and 2020 nearly a third of bookshops closed, while chains command wholesale discounts of 50–70% against 20–50% for independents.

The View From The Beach

Publishers’ core fear is demand. With at least five Polish houses closing or suspending in 2026, they argue higher prices will shrink print runs and title diversity. The consultation process – and whether the royalty floor survives intact – will decide the shape of a market of growing continental significance.

This post first appeared in the TNPS LinkedIn newsfeed.