BOOK EXPRESS Lowers Prices By 32%, Challenges Readers

Information.

http://www.prlog.org/10290769-book-express-lowers-prices-by-32-and-issues-challenge-to-readers.html

You always amaze me with your book promotion. You set the example for me.

I tried the link but it didn't work.

Try again, Abe; it worked fine for me.

Good luck with the promotion, DT!

Worked for me, too. How big an impact will that have on your royalties, DT?

Dick Stodghill wrote:

Worked for me, too. How big an impact will that have on your royalties, DT?

Dick, it is a 1/3 hit, but the number is still much better than any percentage I get from my traditional book deal.

Abe F. March wrote:

I tried again and got the same comment: "Oops. The link appears to be broken."

Very strange Abe. Type "book express lowers" into google and the press release should come up.

Sign of the times I say.
In my day job I visit a lot of book stores and the amount of price reductions you see going on makes you realise how this credit crunch is progressing.

Dt,
I did the Google approach and it said: "This link appears to be broken."

Perhaps its your browser, Abe. I've been there several times now, and my McAfee gives it a green light. Hope you find a way there. It's worth the trip.

Ann

Abe go to http://eprintwire.org/ . They picked up the press release as a top publishing story and have it listed.

If it increases sales, the lower royalty will put you ahead in the long run, as you know of course. Hope it works out well.

Dick it is a long term strategy. I am finding out about the issues that traditional publishers are having with ebook pricing on bestsellers. The wholesale price that resellers pay for most ebook bestsellers is the same as for a hardcover which means the $9.99 sales price is losing money for the online retailer. This is an interesting article on the subject. I have brought up this issue before of the problem ebooks present in a traditional sense.

http://gigaom.com/2009/07/21/will-publishers-ever-make-money-off-ebooks/

Thanks for the reference. I also read the comments. I noted that several alluded to my position in another thread here that the publisher's role was not as "critical" as one might traditionally believe. I was "whacked" for saying such a blasphemous thing; but I hold that ebooks are the crossroads between "before" and "after." Just the textbook industry alone charges exhorbitantly for their texts, requiring upgrades each year. Ebook texts, easily modified with new information, is a revolution for which I am applauding. Those changes can be made author to ebook, bypassing the publisher and their shiny, new $150 edition each year.

My school no longer has a brick and morter bookstore but instead an online bookstore. Texts are already less expensive because of the "marketplace" used books available from unlimited sources and the new books purchased by the online bookstore vendor at quantity discounts. Times, they are a changing.

dkchristi wrote:

Thanks for the reference. I also read the comments. I noted that several alluded to my position in another thread here that the publisher's role was not as "critical" as one might traditionally believe.

Which comment was that? There are eight comments (or were when I looked), and I didn't see one that said that.

I agree with the comment that the article was mistitled. The publishers are making money -Amazon's the one taking the loss, selling ebooks as a loss leader. How are Amazon or B/N going to pressure publishers to lower their wholesale prices?

As an aside, I've just started seeing some iconic Wiley textbooks on Kindle. They're about four dollars cheaper than the print versions. So much for $9.99 textbooks. Why on earth would anyone buy a Kindle text for four bucks less than the print version??

As for changes in subsequent editions, they cannot simply be made by the author to an ebook. Even the simplest text-only book requires a new pdf to be created. With an illustrated book, the comp house has to be hired again to lay out the pages. Plus, a changed book goes out for reviews again, for which reviewers are paid. Text pubs pay thousands to each reviewer for their texts, and at least five reviewers are typically involved.

dkchristi wrote:

My school no longer has a brick and morter bookstore but instead an online bookstore. Texts are already less expensive because of the "marketplace" used books available from unlimited sources and the new books purchased by the online bookstore vendor at quantity discounts. Times, they are a changing.

I'm not following. efollet and B/N, the largest online textbook sellers, only manage college online bookstores; students still stand in line to pick up the actual texts at the college's brick and mortar store. The texts are the same price whether students order them online or buy them at the physical store. And the prices are the publishers' retail prices. You do know that there is no wholesale to college bookstores, right? If you compare online efollet and b/n prices to the the pubs' websites, the prices are identical. In fact, some college online store prices are even higher.

Are you perhaps referring to all the secondary online resellers of books? College bookstores will buy back texts that aren't adopted or used on campus anymore if there's a market elsewhere, as determined by the secondary sellers. Students can score bargains if they're willing to risk buying from these parties.

All these steps are presently part of the traditional process. The time may come when there are fewer steps between the author and the reader, regardless of the medium. It may not be in our time, but it's coming. A friend of mine suggested he'd rather not read at all but have instead a chip with 140 books implanted in his brain so that the content went stright to thought. At some time, all knowledge may be available on chip from which the "reader" synthesizes their own books. When I was in college, a friend's thesis involved the words and styles of famous poets providing a database for writing new poetry in that poet's voice. No one thought the 8 track would be a museum piece, or the walkman. The ipod eliminates cd's and cd players. Downloading from the internet eliminates a lot of program installations from boxes and packages as well as disk media. Who has a "floppy" anymore? Even jumpdrives are losing their place. If anything, the publishing industry is archaic as it clings to "tradition." It's the small publishers with innovative spirit that will pave the way for the future; they have minimal staff and authors who participate in the process. Some put out print runs, POD, hard copy and trade paperback, ebooks in all formats, and audio. The gamut is covered until the winners step forward. It's an exciting and challenging time that will be full of surprises for some and "ah hahs" for others. When's the last time you sat for your portrait? Painted, I mean. Who still has a "Polaroid" or an "instant Kodak" camera? Did you try to get parts for your two-year old cell phone lately? They don't bother to make them; the phones are changing too rapidly. What a whirlwind we have entered where that cell phone is our camera, our Internet, our planner, our ebook reader and more. Somewhere in that miniaturization, people disappeared and technology moved up a notch.

DK, I'm not arguing that technology changes. I was simply responding to points made in your post and that article. For the here and now, they don't apply or were incorrect. Online textbook stores have not made textbooks cheaper. They HAVE opened more used venues to students, sure; my college daughter buys many of her texts at half.com (heavily adopted ones are never truly "half," though; if available at all, they're close to retail price. And NO RETURNS, a true danger when the prof changes the posted book adoption at the last minute or the bookstore gets it wrong. It happens).

I don't know what futuristic advances will make laying out a graphics-heavy page easier, but it isn't here yet, and until it gets here, I rely on my pub for hiring a comp house. And for hiring a cover artist, hiring an art director to oversee things, hiring reviewers, hiring sales people, and maintaining contacts with major retailers and reviewers. None of this is trivial to me and nothing I care to take on solo. Props to those that do.

Quote :

The ipod eliminates cd's and cd players. Downloading from the internet eliminates a lot of program installations from boxes and packages as well as disk media.

So do you see this eliminating the need for ambitious artists to go through Sony or Warner Music anymore?

Since I'm responsible for setting up my school's online bookstore, I can attest that 1) the new, retail text books are less expensive than when we sold them in our brick and morter bookstore; 2) we no longer have a brick and morter book store except for a nook that sells t-shirts and latte; 3) all books are returnable with 30-day restrictions; 4) books may be sold back at half price if they are on instructional lists for the next year; 5) used books are available from a vast "marketplace," and 6) students may shop any source they wish if our online bookstore doesn't meet their needs.

Instructors add and delete books and their own prepared booklets for student use directly from the online bookstore site where their classes are listed, using their instructor codes.

I only know my bookstore and cannot provide any information in comparison to any other school's methods for supplying texts to their students. I always buy my books online for any class I take.

What do you mean you "set up" your college's online bookstore? Are you saying you run it, created the website, what?

A lot of schools still run their own bookstores (including the one I teach at). However, many more are managed by www.efollett.com or www.bncollege.com. If you compare prices of any random book from their sites against the book on the pub's own site, you will see that most, if not all, are the same price. Or higher at the college site.

Yes, the college bookstore takes returns. I meant that secondary online sellers usually don't.

No one on our campus "runs" the bookstore. It is completely online. A small software company programmed the mechanics, and it is still in partial development. They provide the technical support. I am responsible for interfacing with our web site, preparing FAQ's, working with the instructors, and generally resolving issues. I have another full-time position.

Ok, well it sounds like it was contracted out to someone. Some schools do that; it's far more common to let efollet and b/n manage it, though.

To clarify when I say the prices are the same at the pub and college online stores: obviously I'm referring to new prices. Of course colleges sell used copies, although they don't sell them for a whole lot less than the new ones. When I say secondary market, I mean third parties like BetterWorld, Cash4Books, etc. And the market isn't really that vast for heavily adopted, in-demand texts. Our college buys as many good-quality used copies as it can, but still has to stock plenty of new texts.

The new prices are less than we could provide previously. Used books are available through the same third party sellers you reference as well as individuals, as part of the online sales. Our school buys nothing and is merely the conduit through our web site for students to reach the online bookstore where the texts specific to our instructional programs are available, new and used (when it's not a new edition....etc. etc.) This is the first year - wish me luck!