BooksOnBoard reports major changes in ebook pricing

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by ATimson

Well, agency pricing isn't applied to S&S yet at either one, it looks like - checked both for Margaret Wander Bonanno's new book (), and found that their prices on her backlist vary.

It's hard to find Unspoken Truth in ePub at a price I'm willing to pay. And not many places have it. If I was to buy it now, I'd get it from Amazon, strip the DRM, and convert to ePub.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by MV64

This could really hurt ebook sales across the board. We all know the arguments for cheaper ebooks, but I just want to re-emphasize how stupid it is to charge 15 or 25 bucks for an ebook when it a couple months the regular book will be 5-10 bucks. And the ebook price doesn't change (at least it hasn't so far, they stay that full price long after a title enters paperback status).

Supposedly with the agency pricing in effect, that won't happen. Prices are supposed to change. We'll just have to wait and see what happens.

[FireFeather]

In addition to my last note, if some bookstores are choosing to cheat the system opening, what happens to them, and conversely, our purchases in those stores?

[DawnFalcon]

Download everything, preferably not in mobipocket.

[FireFeather]

Originally Posted by DawnFalcon

Download everything, preferably not in mobipocket.

Hehe isn't that the truth. I do keep "cleaned" copies of all my purchases, but in the small case my personal backups fail... Bad times.

[DawnFalcon]

The mobipocket thing is just because it's device-linked, heh.

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Take Sunborn for example. I have a 15% coupon for B&N. I can buy Sunborn for $7.23 (after tax) vs. $7.99 for the eBook.

Or you could d/l it for free from Jeffery Carver's web site.

http://starrigger.net/Downloads.htm

Or, did you mean a different Sunborn?

BTW: It is 6.36 at the Kindle store. You know you want a Kindle.

BOb

[Blue Tyson]

Originally Posted by FireFeather

Hehe isn't that the truth. I do keep "cleaned" copies of all my purchases, but in the small case my personal backups fail... Bad times.

Books being not that big - a freemail account can provide another backup for such, too.

[Kris777]

SALES: Amazon and Barnes & Noble were pressured to let publishers set prices after Apple reached a deal for iPad.

Amazon.com Inc. and Barnes & Noble Inc. increased electronic book prices for many bestsellers on their Web sites Friday after agreeing to give publishers control over how much their products cost online.

Author Hilary Mantel's "Wolf Hall," published by Macmillan, costs $12.99 for delivery to the Amazon.com Kindle and Barnes & Noble Nook, up from $9.99 previously. The price change was the same for the e-book version of the "The Help" by Kathryn Stockett.

Amazon and Barnes & Noble had been under pressure to allow publishers to set prices for their digital books after Apple Inc. reached a similar accord for its iPad, being released today. Apple will let publishers determine the price of titles and give them 70 percent of the revenue, people familiar with the situation said in February.
...
http://www.pe.com/business/local/sto...3.3ec5266.html

We can say "thank you" to Apple for cooperation with publishers and for new eBook pricing... good job!

[leonardfrye]

Amazon pricing for Preston/Child books:

The Cabinet of Curiosities - paperback $7.99 - ebook $22.99
Still Life with Crows - paperback $7.99 - ebook $19.99

[DawnFalcon]

Amazon prices?

" Hachette Book Group
This price was set by the publisher"

Hmm.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by leonardfrye

Amazon pricing for Preston/Child books:

The Cabinet of Curiosities - paperback $7.99 - ebook $22.99
Still Life with Crows - paperback $7.99 - ebook $19.99

It seems this agency pricing is not working out all that well.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

It seems this agency pricing is not working out all that well.

And even where it almost does, it doesn't. E.g.

The Lord of the Rings:

Kindle price: $14.99, set by the publisher, 25% off the print RRP ($20)
Amazon Paperback price: $13.60, 32% off the print price.

Assuming a 50% discount to Amazon on the print price, Amazon are making $3.60 from the print sale, and $4.50 from the Kindle sale. And the publishers are making $10 less printing/storage costs (so, say $8) from the print sale, and $10.49 from the Kindle sale.

So both retailer and publisher and making /more/ per sale from the Kindle ebook than from the print book sale, and the consumer is paying more.

Way to go to kill the ebook market!

Now a $9.99 RRP on a 30:70 split would have given the publisher $7 (just a little less than the paper book!) and Amazon $3 (just little less than for the paper book).

So the agency model isn't entirely insane - in that it is sensible to cut the percentage of RRP that the retailer gets, since there aren't the same costs involved in selling ebooks as paperbooks (no inventory management, storage, transport, packing). But requiring retailers to keep a fixed price is foolish. And setting the RRP too high while doing so is even more foolish!

Checking my records, I see I paid $10.47* for my ebook of The Lord of the Rings back in April 2009.

Sigh.

*Well, I paid $20.94, but on 100% micropay rebate, which means it was effectively half price. I don't think I would have paid $20.

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Assuming a 50% discount to Amazon on the print price, Amazon are making $3.60 from the print sale, and $4.50 from the Kindle sale. And the publishers are making $10 less printing/storage costs (so, say $8) from the print sale, and $10.49 from the Kindle sale.

So both retailer and publisher and making /more/ per sale from the Kindle ebook than from the print book sale, and the consumer is paying more.

But Macmillan told us they would make LESS for book with the Agency model. Are you saying there were not honest about that. Oh the humanity!

BOb

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

But Macmillan told us they would make LESS for book with the Agency model. Are you saying there were not honest about that. Oh the humanity!

Less on the ebook than before the agency model. Umm... so yes, in that particular instance, assuming thet priced the ebook the same as the paperback before the agency model, and I guessed right about the discount. $10 before and $10.49 after.

If we assume they weren't lying, it means I must have guessed the pre-agency discount wrong. Perhaps they got 55% of the price. In which case:

pre-agency: 55% of $20 = $11
after: 70% of $14.99 = $10.49

But I would have thought that pre-agency they were likely to have been getting /less/ than 50% of RRP, not more than 50%, since the 'standard' industry discount for paper books is 55%, leaving the publisher with 45%.

Of course, this is just one book. It'll take looking at lots of books after things settle down to see if the big publishers are using the agency model as they said they would.