Amazon's threat to pod publishers in the US
Over the weekend, there was a tremendous amount of traffic on the self-publishing and Yahoo groups to which I belong. At first, due to my playground sense of humour (I do have others by the way), I suspected this might be an elaborate April Fool's joke. But now it would appear to be true.
Amazon contacted a number of US small presses and self-publishers to say that if they didn't use Amazon's in house print on demand wing called BookSurge then the "Buy" buttons on the Amazon page for their books will be removed. They could then only sell their books on Amazon through a third party.
Word quickly spread among the small presses and self-publishers who had been approached with this “offer they couldn’t refuse.” Approaches seemed to have been made by phone call with nothing in writing. It was all very mysterious and I couldn’t help feel that somebody was (successfully) winding an awful lot of people up.
For many, BookSurge is not the first choice of printer for print on demand (henceforth to be referred to as pod). From what I can gather on the discussion groups, its terms are not particularly attractive and there have been concerns over the quality of the finished product.
Most pod books in the US are printed by Lightning Source International, a wholly owned subsidiary of book wholesalers Ingram and provider of pod services to many mainstream publishers.
Transferring from one pod printer to another will incur a new set up charge and in the terms offered by BookSurge a far greater discount will be required typically 55% of sale price. As pod books are more expensive to produce, many will become uneconomic to produce under these terms.
In a statement yesterday, Amazon stated that this was being done in the name of customer service. They claim that it makes more sense to print pod books in house rather than wait for externally printed books to arrive for shipment.
Apparently, externally printed books will still be available through the US Amazon distribution network provided at least five pod books per title are offered for stock! This just seems nuts to me. Presumably, they’ll have to be offered at Amazon’s standard 55% discount on sale price and there will then be a stock holding charge to the publisher.
Amazon's claims are at odds with the points made by Publisher's World, the numerous self-publishing blogs in the US and the Yahoo discussion groups on pod and self-publishing.
The view here is that Amazon will be effectively removing thousands of books from its catalogue. The customer service argument has been challenged, too, since BookSurge is based in a different state from Amazon’s despatch centre. And even with the most customer-centric will in the world, BookSurge don’t appear to have the production capacity to cope with the transfer of hundreds of thousands of pod books.
There are already cries of “Monopoly!” and “Anti-trust!”
The proposal to keep stocks of pod books REALLY annoys the US pod publishers. It certainly appears a very crass suggestion to me. Does Amazon really understand what pod means?
Ingram responded with a carefully worded responsecarefully worded response saying that this was not an attack on them or their subsidiary by Amazon but that “publishers are telling us they feel Amazon.com’s actions are not appropriate.” John Ingram himself said that “At Ingram Book and Lightning Source, we are going to work really hard to continue to be the compelling choice as publishers make their outsourcing decisions."
It remains to be seen what the reaction by Ingram and Lightning Source will be. But many self-publishers and small presses are already reacting angrily to what they see as strong arm tactics and are actively seeking alternative means of reaching their customers such as Barnes & Noble’s online store.
It looks to me as if Amazon have an objective of achieving 55% discount on sales price for every book they handle. At the moment many small publishers like me can determine their own discount through using Lightning Source. For instance, mine is 25% so my book is viable. I think this is what this move is really about.
Most pod sales from the small presses are probably insignificant but there are some much bigger players that use pod, namely the mainstream publishers who use it to keep many of their back list title available. Then there are the high profile pod companies like Lulu, Publish America and iUniverse. Guess who they use? Lightning Source.
Amazon are in danger of killing the golden geese that are laying the golden eggs. They might have a celebratory slap up binge on the still warm corpses but will ultimately end up with an eider down of very lumpy and very cold golden goose feathers.
But – y’know – I have a feeling that there will be a creative leakage around this in the longer term, if the big publishers cave in, which I doubt.
There’s clearly a demand and a need for cost effective print on demand books. Using Amazon has been easy up to now but if it gets difficult then publishers will go elsewhere and do their damnedest to take their customers elsewhere. The discussion groups suggest that this is already happening. .
There are some very savvy people in self-publishing and they know an awful lot about publicising themselves and their books. At the moment they are venting their collective spleens against Amazon, a business which may not care about this right now. But if it sees significant market share going elsewhere then it will re-consider its actions.
It is also too early to tell what the impact will be in the UK. As a happy Lightning Source UK customer I know that Lightning Source is based in Milton Keynes and Amazon UK’s despatch centre is just down the road from them in Marston. I don’t know if BookSurge has a printing base in the UK but from where I’m writing, Amazon’s arguments in the US favour neither its customers nor its suppliers.
And as of now, The Horsepower Whisperer is still available from Amazon with its "Buy" buttons and with free delivery.
Amazon contacted a number of US small presses and self-publishers to say that if they didn't use Amazon's in house print on demand wing called BookSurge then the "Buy" buttons on the Amazon page for their books will be removed. They could then only sell their books on Amazon through a third party.
Word quickly spread among the small presses and self-publishers who had been approached with this “offer they couldn’t refuse.” Approaches seemed to have been made by phone call with nothing in writing. It was all very mysterious and I couldn’t help feel that somebody was (successfully) winding an awful lot of people up.
For many, BookSurge is not the first choice of printer for print on demand (henceforth to be referred to as pod). From what I can gather on the discussion groups, its terms are not particularly attractive and there have been concerns over the quality of the finished product.
Most pod books in the US are printed by Lightning Source International, a wholly owned subsidiary of book wholesalers Ingram and provider of pod services to many mainstream publishers.
Transferring from one pod printer to another will incur a new set up charge and in the terms offered by BookSurge a far greater discount will be required typically 55% of sale price. As pod books are more expensive to produce, many will become uneconomic to produce under these terms.
In a statement yesterday, Amazon stated that this was being done in the name of customer service. They claim that it makes more sense to print pod books in house rather than wait for externally printed books to arrive for shipment.
Apparently, externally printed books will still be available through the US Amazon distribution network provided at least five pod books per title are offered for stock! This just seems nuts to me. Presumably, they’ll have to be offered at Amazon’s standard 55% discount on sale price and there will then be a stock holding charge to the publisher.
Amazon's claims are at odds with the points made by Publisher's World, the numerous self-publishing blogs in the US and the Yahoo discussion groups on pod and self-publishing.
The view here is that Amazon will be effectively removing thousands of books from its catalogue. The customer service argument has been challenged, too, since BookSurge is based in a different state from Amazon’s despatch centre. And even with the most customer-centric will in the world, BookSurge don’t appear to have the production capacity to cope with the transfer of hundreds of thousands of pod books.
There are already cries of “Monopoly!” and “Anti-trust!”
The proposal to keep stocks of pod books REALLY annoys the US pod publishers. It certainly appears a very crass suggestion to me. Does Amazon really understand what pod means?
Ingram responded with a carefully worded responsecarefully worded response saying that this was not an attack on them or their subsidiary by Amazon but that “publishers are telling us they feel Amazon.com’s actions are not appropriate.” John Ingram himself said that “At Ingram Book and Lightning Source, we are going to work really hard to continue to be the compelling choice as publishers make their outsourcing decisions."
It remains to be seen what the reaction by Ingram and Lightning Source will be. But many self-publishers and small presses are already reacting angrily to what they see as strong arm tactics and are actively seeking alternative means of reaching their customers such as Barnes & Noble’s online store.
It looks to me as if Amazon have an objective of achieving 55% discount on sales price for every book they handle. At the moment many small publishers like me can determine their own discount through using Lightning Source. For instance, mine is 25% so my book is viable. I think this is what this move is really about.
Most pod sales from the small presses are probably insignificant but there are some much bigger players that use pod, namely the mainstream publishers who use it to keep many of their back list title available. Then there are the high profile pod companies like Lulu, Publish America and iUniverse. Guess who they use? Lightning Source.
Amazon are in danger of killing the golden geese that are laying the golden eggs. They might have a celebratory slap up binge on the still warm corpses but will ultimately end up with an eider down of very lumpy and very cold golden goose feathers.
But – y’know – I have a feeling that there will be a creative leakage around this in the longer term, if the big publishers cave in, which I doubt.
There’s clearly a demand and a need for cost effective print on demand books. Using Amazon has been easy up to now but if it gets difficult then publishers will go elsewhere and do their damnedest to take their customers elsewhere. The discussion groups suggest that this is already happening. .
There are some very savvy people in self-publishing and they know an awful lot about publicising themselves and their books. At the moment they are venting their collective spleens against Amazon, a business which may not care about this right now. But if it sees significant market share going elsewhere then it will re-consider its actions.
It is also too early to tell what the impact will be in the UK. As a happy Lightning Source UK customer I know that Lightning Source is based in Milton Keynes and Amazon UK’s despatch centre is just down the road from them in Marston. I don’t know if BookSurge has a printing base in the UK but from where I’m writing, Amazon’s arguments in the US favour neither its customers nor its suppliers.
And as of now, The Horsepower Whisperer is still available from Amazon with its "Buy" buttons and with free delivery.
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