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The measures applied in Italy to contain the spread of COVID-19 took a massive economic toll from bookstores on the territory. This is what emerges from an analysis published by AIE (Italian Publishers Association), which compared sales in the COVID-emergency weeks with sales in the same period in 2019. Starting from halfway into **, i.e. March, ****, bookstores were closed by law and they were allowed to reopen only on April, ****, i.e. on **. The data revealed how the uncertainty surrounding the health situation in the country affected bookstores sales already in **, when no restrictions where enforced, but sales decreased already by ** percent. The lowest point was reached on ** when sales were close to zero, resulting from a ** percent decrease from the same week in 2019. Overall, Italian bookstores in the sample under consideration reported an ** percent decrease in sales percentage over the weeks 11-15 compared to the previous year.