Who Will Buy An eReader?

[Alisa]

Originally Posted by Kris777

Well, not all people worked in an office...

Like I said, my retired father never used a computer until he retired, was completely computer illiterate and still occasionally calls me with questions like "A box came up and I hit ok and now it doesn't work". He shops online and uses his iPod just fine. He's pretty typical of the folks I know in that generation.

[doreenjoy]

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

Well, I can see how if you've got a demographic that isn't buying from Amazon, but buys books at Target or Walmart, then putting an e-book reader at that point of sale can be an advantage. I also have a hard time picturing Amazon selling the Kindle anywhere other than on their site, since that means giving up a big chunk of revenue.

But....

Can someone explain to me how a group that reads a lot, but apparently does not spend a lot of money on books and are not tech-savvy, is:

a) likely to drop $200 - 300 on an e-book reader
b) going to prefer using intermediary software, rather than getting delivery right from the point of purchase and/or buying the books right on the device
c) likely to be a big source of revenue for books

This group is the RAVENOUS ROMANCE READERS. Their motivation for going to e-books is *not* that they like technology. Far from it. The advantage of an e-reader to this crowd is that their husbands can no longer see the huge pile of books the reader wife is buying.

The Harlequin-branded red Sony reader sold out in just a few months, and this is the crowd that bought them. These readers do have money, and they do buy books. LOTS of books. Some of them read more than 5 books per week.

And this group of readers will pay the premium for an e-book reader to "hide" their reading habit from irritable husbands. The software is intuitive and works just like iTunes, which many of them are familiar with.

(Naturally I'm generalizing here, for the purpose of making a point)

This group is also the typical Target shopper. They will buy a product simply because it is in Target, and they trust Target, and they know they can return it if they need to. And as someone else said, they won't spend that kind of money on something they haven't seen in person (which makes Kindle a non-starter for them, unless a friend has one they've seen).

They're not likely to spend time here on MR, which is why no one here recognizes the huge buying power of this group. Folks here seem to think e-readers appeal only to male techies.