I think most people are vastly over-estimating the number of books that get sold. From http://www.midwestbookreview.com/bookbiz/advice/bestlist.htm http://www.

I think most people are vastly over-estimating the number of books that get sold. From http://www.midwestbookreview.com/bookbiz/advice/bestlist.htm http://www.midwestbookreview.com/bookbiz/advice/bestlist.htm which is an old resource but the numbers are still within the same range: "It does not take a tremendous amount of book sales to make a bestseller list. Depending upon the competition and category, sales of 50,000 books through bookstores over a period of weeks could do it. Some books have made #10 with sales of just 3,000 in one week. Most print runs are just 5,000 books, so 3,000 is a lot of books. On the other hand, with 119,000 titles being published each year, there is some competition for attention. In 1995, there were 93 hardcover fiction titles that sold more than 100,000 copies and 101 hardcover nonfiction title over that number. Softcover books did even better. Most first printings are 5,000 copies, and any book selling 5,000 copies a year is considered successful."