Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
But you wouldn't only have to wait 10 minutes. If you among the first people in the bookshop in the morning, and there were 5 people at the checkout in front of you buying only 1 book each, you'd be waiting an hour. If there were 20 books waiting to be printed ahead of yours, you'd be waiting three and a half hours. It just wouldn't work. Even if the bookshop printed 24h a day, and the printer worked perfectly, you could only print 144 books a day. That's not very many for even a moderately successful bookshop.
|
Where POD fits in the (potential) B&M bookstore of the near future is in extending the store's catalog, avoiding the weeks and even months of wait for "special order" titles (aka, "if you really prefer to pay full list and wait weeks on end instead of ordering online, we'll grudgingly take your money" books), and allowing an in-store pickup for online orders.
You are correct that a bookstore cannot run solely off POD but POD can be part of the equation. Partly because the bulk of bookstore sales in any given day (say 80%) is new titles and the frontlist titles they are paid to promote. That is, after all, why supermarkets and discount department stores have been squeezing bookstores since before the Age of Amazon.
It's the shelf space version of the Pareto Principle, more or less. With the nasty side effect that the 80% slow movers clogging the shelves are the store's reason for existing. The 20% cash cows can be had anywhere, without the added overhead burden of the midlist/backlist. Theoretically, that is where POD fits in, trading off the capital expense of the devices for reduced floorspace (and way lower rent), an actual online presence that makes sense, and higher backlist sales.
It *could* work.
We'll more as the ongoing experiments play out.
BTW, how slow (or fast) are B&M special orders in the UK?
Are the publisher fulfillment process any better than in the US?
Inquiring minds and all that.
Plus, it impacts the POD value proposition.