[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

From what I read about those meetings and having been in many a meeting...they should probably all be canceled...

I've been in them too, and don't I just wish. But there's still a question of how much they add to costs.

Yes, you're right about the ones who have a traditional background/experience. The interest isn't done via kindleboards, it's just authors reporting their 'deal." Two or three have gone with Amazon Encore and another one ... I think her husband signed with TOR if I remember correctly. Two or three others have signed with some fairly big named agents. If that is the dream, well, it probably won't hurt them to go down that path for a while.

Oh, sure. And getting interest from Tor is certainly a plus. I know an assortment of the Tor folks, and their offices are within walking distance of me. I consider Tor one of the best houses out there, and Tom Doherty, Tor's founder and CEO, has probably forgotten more about publishing than most folks will ever learn. If the bug strikes me and I produce a novel, Tor will be the house where I would want to place it.

The same if they get nibbles from recognized agents. But there's a whole sleazy ecosystem preying on wannabe writers, from agents who charge "reading fees" to publishers that are vanity presses in disguise.

The trick is telling the difference.

Yes, and to be competitive, it's got to be darned hard to make the numbers make sense when your building space is in NY.

Yes! Especially when you occupy it under a multi-year lease, or you own the building, and you can't just pick up and move somewhere where the costs are lower. (Leaving aside what your employees who live in the area will think of being asked to relocate.)

I disagree. I was a buyer of her "products." The only reason I didn't buy more was because they were too expensive. They were also extremely slow to get into ebook form those times a book was chosen to be put in ebook form. Had she been more competitive with pricing, I would have bought a couple more books. At 15 a pop, I got three via the library and still haven't bought one because I'm hoping it will go ebook and be cheaper via that route. Speaking as her audience, not as an author--the publisher put out mass market type mystery books in trade format. If she could have done it cheaper, she should have. I would have bought the books had they been priced better.

Fair enough. But the questions are "Could she do it cheaper?", and if she could, "Should she?"

Pricing is a black art. We all want books priced cheaper, but the best price (in terms of yielding the most revenue and profit) probably isn't the cheapest possible price. Price too cheap and you can lose overall, because the regular customers buy at the cheaper rate, and the additional sales don't make up for what you lose by discounting.

The fact that a price is higher than I want to pay doesn't necessarily mean it's the wrong price - only that I won't pay it.

I think the big boys need to set up smaller shops to address it in some manner. I don't particularly *care* if they do. At the moment I am finding plenty of books to read. I know their goal is to make money, but they haven't done much to try to get rid of waste (like the discussion on returns.) Sure the booksellers are going to fight them on it. But it's been hurting the industry for a long time--ingrained policies usually do.

It's a Catch-22 situation. I had a conversation the other night with a woman who had been a editor for many years before retiring. She said, among other things, that the "100% returns" policy which has been hurting the industry for decades originated way back when to get bookstores to take a chance on stocking new and unfamiliar work. If it didn't sell, they could send it back. There have been a few experiments by publishers offering a higher discount in exchange for limits on what could be returned, requiring the bookstore to estimate demand the same way retailers in other industries must. They haven't gotten far. Making it stick will require the major houses to all agree to do it and stick to the resolve, and won't there be a hue and cry about collusion and the like if they did?

It's a problem similar to the one of "too many books chasing too few readers". Everyone knew there were too many titles being published, but nobody wanted to be the first to trim their lines, because they were afraid that they would lose retail shelf space and not get it back. So things would go on until someone finally bit the bullet and trimmed their line, and the rest would follow in a wrenching spasm, with attendant authors being dropped from contract and people people losing jobs.

The current Big 6 is another side effect, as bigger houses acquired smaller ones in attempts to gain economies of scale (again, with attendant job losses.)

Lots of things that might be done, but nobody wants to be the first to try it if they think it will make them vulnerable to a competitor.

Your points are all valid--but the world is changing and I think those who are able to offer a good product at a lower price are going to do well. Large Publishers need to at least address that niche market rather than whine about it!

Large publishers may not be able to address niche markets.

I think something like what you suggest - setting up smaller subsidiaries to go after niches - will be the direction taken. While size can yield economies of scale, it also places lower limits on the size a market has to be to address profitably.
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Dennis