Ukrainian drone strikes on Wildberries warehouses destroyed 15 million books, Russian officials say

Vladimir Grigoriev, director of the Periodicals and Book Industry Support Department at the Digital Development Ministry, said drone strikes on Wildberries warehouses have cost Russia’s book industry 6 billion rubles, according to the Russian business daily Kommersant.

Grigoriev said the warehouse fires destroyed 15 million books.

Eksmo CEO Yevgeny Kapyev suggested the number of books lost could rise to 20 million.

Grigoriev said the industry is considering a reduced 5% VAT rate for one year. Eksmo has proposed lowering VAT on printed products, banning the recapture of previously deducted VAT on destroyed goods, and letting publishers deduct the full value of those goods as an expense. The publisher has also called for preferential lending to help replenish working capital.

Ukraine has been striking Wildberries’ largest warehouses across Russia since mid-June. Damage to the marketplace and its sellers is already estimated at hundreds of billions of rubles. Since late August, Ukraine has also begun striking warehouses belonging to Ozon, Russia’s second-largest marketplace. The first Ozon facility hit was a logistics center in the Samara region, followed by warehouses in other regions.

Russia has also been striking warehouses in Ukraine. Ukrainian publishers say Russian attacks have destroyed more than 10 million books in recent months. A children’s book publisher in Kharkiv alone lost about 8 million copies to a fire after an August 1 attack.