Seattle Mystery Bookshop

Why the Seattle Mystery Bookshop Must Close

 

 

I’ve worked here almost since the day it was open for business. At first, I was here just one day a week, so that Bill could have a day off – which he used to do bookkeeping at home. I remember their long dinning room table which was covered with pile after pile of paperwork. I don’t know where they ate dinner. Slowly, this place absorbed my life until my brain looked like Bill’s dining room table. In ’98, when he felt like stepping back from ownership, Bill offered to sell it to me but, happily, he kept working with us all. It has been a great honor to own the Seattle Mystery Bookshop since 1999. Sadly, that is now going to come to an end.

The Seattle Mystery Bookshop will close on Saturday, September 30th at the end of the day.

Why? There are so many reasons. Blame Amazon? Sure, that’s the easy thing to say but the massive changes in the world of bookselling are far larger than that. In fact, the changes in the over-all economy make it a much, much bigger story.

To be fair, you have to look back to the rise of mega-stores like Barnes & Noble. They were exciting but they began the phenomena of deeply discounting books. They wanted bodies in the stores, they wanted customers to buy books and CDs and calendars and to drink coffee and browse magazines and they were willing to use books as a loss leader to get you in there. And people went. There was no way for small independents to compete with what a large corporation could do, or what they demanded from the publishers. Publishers paid more attention to them because they had to. Publishers let them do things (claiming a certain percentage of damage from each shipment without detailing which and what; getting placement fees for putting books in prominent places; author events denied to small shops) not allowed to the small independents. That would come back to bite them when Borders collapsed and left a significant hole in the publishers’ business model.

The next blow to independent booksellers came from the rise of e-books and here, too, publishers made a terrible mistake. For decades, publishers released some books in hardcover and some as paperback originals – mass market paperbacks to be precise. In a year, the books in hardcover would usually be released in paperback. That way, those who could afford to buy hardcovers and who didn’t want or need to wait could get it when it was new. Those who couldn’t afford the hardcover price knew they could get it at the library or get it in paperback in a year. This was a model that allowed all budgets to get books - a true mass market for books.

Think of Hollywood. Movies would come out and play for weeks or months. You could go to it and pay full price at night, or go see a matinee for a bit less. If your city had them, you could wait to catch a movie you wanted at a second run theater, weeks after it premiered but months before it might, might, show up on cable. Again, it was a model that allowed for a mass audience. When movies on cassette became practical, think of what it would have done to the Hollywood model if movies could be rented at the same time they hit theaters allowing people to see a movie for far cheaper than going to a theater?

That’s what publishers did. They allowed a far less expensive version of their books to be available right away, undercutting the sale of hardcovers with the cheaper e-version. What they should’ve done was to give the hardcovers time to sell before releasing the e-book along with the mass market. But they didn’t. They way they did it took the legs out of the publishing of hardcovers. In reaction, in order to make up for dropping sales, they upped the price of all books, driving more of the market to the cheaper alternative of e-books. And they blew it with paperbacks, too. They said the marketplace was moving away from mass markets, that readers, and bookclubs, and booksellers wanted trade paperbacks at twice the price of the mass market. The mass market paperback was dead. If it was, they murdered it.  The fallacy here is that trade paperbacks limit the number of books that someone with limited disposable income can buy AND those higher priced trade paperbacks were undercut by the e-book prices as well. (Now, it should be noted, that publishers are beginning to release titles that have been trade paperbacks as mass markets. We’d assume sales of the more expensive trade paperbacks have slowed and publishers are trying to lure readers back with the traditionally less expensive softcover. Yet now there are far fewer places to sell those cheaper editions. And now Hollywood allows you to rent movies at home so who needs to go to movie theaters any more!)

The American Booksellers Association moved to stem the tide of readers going to e-books by making it possible for independents to sell them too. But it was pointless. You can’t pay the rent and your employees with the sale of dirt cheap e-books. That’s a business model that cannot work unless you’re a huge outfit that also sells tires and tubesocks.

So, anyway, Big Box stores and on-line and e-book sales are a huge part of it but there are at least two other equal parts.

The second is the over-all economy. The Great Recession took away a lot of jobs and dislocated a ton of folks – especially in downtown Seattle, where we are. Suddenly, the disposable income that they’d used to buy books was greatly lowered, if there at all. And as the prices for everything increased so that sales and sales taxes could bring in something like what was needed to pay the city’s bills, there was much more competition for our fun money; gas was higher and parking cost more as the city tried to find new sources of funds since fewer people were employed… and the merry-go-round stopped spinning as it had. Those people who suddenly had less money to spend were heavily drawn to those inexpensive e-books, or to the library. All those new millionaires and billionaires might be good for investment bankers and real estate developers, but they can only buy and read so many books. The mass audience for books was sidelined after that crash. You still hear news stories about how “middle class” wages are stagnant, and that has a direct effect on sales for everyone.

Except at Amazon. Yes, they’re cooking along well, aren’t they? When people have less money to spend on fun stuff they go where they can get the most for their money – to places who discount heavily. And since people are stressed and lack the time to go out shopping, a place that is convenient and that discounts is a godsend, right? Amazon is poised to be the largest apparel seller in the country and Macy’s and Penny’s close stores. No mystery there. 

The third part is generational. For the last decades, the entire publishing world – bookshops, publishers, authors – had been supported by huge post-WWII generations who moved up through their jobs and had the extra money to spoil themselves and their children, and to begin collecting books, collecting hardcovers. After all, there was no alternative to the printed book until books on tape in the late 80s.  As their collections grew, they became more sophisticated in their collecting. They demanded first editions, preferably signed. They’d wait for them, not needing to read them when the book first came out, as long as they’d be able to add another signed copy to the shelves. They’d backfill too, searching for titles they’d missed from an author they’d only recently began to collect. Author tours became the thing and bestselling authors were created from huge lines of collectors and fans. Piles of books would evaporate during a signing and unknown writers quickly became bestsellers authors.

But now that generation of collectors has begun to retire from it. They’re downsizing from the homes in which they reared their children and are moving to smaller apartments or condos or retirement centers. They don’t have room for the collections they so lovingly built. They want them to go to others who will cherish them because their kids or grandkids don’t care. The problem is that every collection is made up of the same authors and the same titles because these authors were vastly popular to a mass audience and were printed in large numbers and now there’s not a generation of collectors coming up to soak up these books. They were reared on TV, they had the pleasure of reading beaten out of them in school, or they, too, have some of these books but don’t feel the need to fill in their collections – it just isn’t their thing. The great collector generation’s grandchildren don’t yet have the disposable income to buy books. They’re saddled with massive college debts, rents and mortgages are sky high, they’re starting their families and babies are expensive, everything’s expensive, they don’t have the disposable income their parents and grandparents had and, what the hell – it is just so easy and cheap to order on-line on their phones where the do most of their reading.

And here we are.

Those are the big reasons. There are many smaller ones, some unique to Seattle and Pioneer Square (unendingly difficult and expensive parking, street construction, the end of the Ride Free zone, viaduct removal, ball games, protests and marches), and some national (the increased use of credit cards and their transaction fees, higher international mail costs, vendors screwing down on payments).

Then, too, there was me. I don’t have the easiest personality and I rub some/many people the wrong way. I can be too impatient and prickly and more than a few people have referred to me as a curmudgeon. I am all of that. I have always known that I have been the shop’s greatest drawback and I know it contributed, in some way, to the fall in sales. If I caused you to shop here less, I apologize.

Just after the LA mystery bookshop closed in 2011, we had a major LA author in to sign. He was still furious that those owners had closed without saying anything – that they were in trouble and needed help. He asked “Why didn’t they ask for help?”  That stuck with me. A few weeks later I composed a letter to that author as well as to two other international bestselling authors who had also been here to sign multiple times and laid out for them their sales with us over the years. I pointed out that sales with in-shop signings were far higher than with signed copies from another source. I asked them to use their influence with their publishers to ensure that small independent mystery shops were made a priority and were put on their tour schedules. I asked what they were prepared to do to help the small mystery bookshops who helped to launch their careers. I heard back from none of them.

We’ve fought with publicity departments for over two decades to be seen as a viable location for their Big Name authors. I’ve made the point that if they don’t send their Big Name authors to us we won’t be here to help their beginning authors get to be Big Names.  I’ve beseeched authors we used to normally get for formal signings but who are now brought by only for stock signings that we need their help, that we need them to talk to their publicity departments. Most shrug it off, declining to get involved with tour schedules. Those who have benefited from the exposure and attention of little shops, who are so grateful for our help launching them into bestsellerdom suddenly do not wish to use their power and leverage to help those who gave them attention and benefits.  “I contacted sales and all the tip-ins went to Barnes and Noble. I have no control over that…” Well who the hell has more control that a major bestselling author?  We’ve done what that author said, we’ve repeatedly asked authors for help… and here we are.

I’m sure some will say we should’ve done more to ask for help, to make our situation clear. We have. We’re written many blog posts about the dangers of not supporting small businesses that will go away if you don’t. A few years ago we had to downsize to survive.  That was a very clear indication that sales were not supporting what we were doing. Clue #1. That move was not enough so we held the Go Fund Me drive to pay off bills that were holding us back. Clue #2. That worked and bought us a year. We let the staff shrink because we couldn’t afford to have the staff we need. Clue #3. Lastly, we tried to sell the place. Clue #4.  The clues were there. We’ve been playing fair all along.

At one time, when this shop was young, there were at least three dozen independent mystery bookshops around the globe. NYC had four. DC had three. Now there are but a handful. It isn’t just us. I am dead certain that none of those that closed wanted to, but, in the end, there was no choice.

We’re all heartbroken to close the shop. I personally feel as if I have failed Bill. But we all fought hard to keep it going for years but the sharp bottom line is people have not been buying enough books from us to keep it working for a long time. Time to say goodbye.

I want to thank all of those loyal customers who have been regulars over the years. It’s been a gas.

What happens next? It’s a mystery.

~ JB

Ursula Le Guin: "I Think Hard Times are Coming"

 

The 65th National Book Awards were held last night in NYC.

The New Yorker's website noted: "But it was Ursula K. Le Guin, accepting the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters early in the evening, who gave the definitive remarks of the ceremony, gliding through the genre debate and the Amazon-Hachette debacle on her way to explaining the crucial role that literature must play in our society. Petite, her silver hair shining, Le Guin shrugged and grinned when Neil Gaiman placed the medal around her neck. She said that she wanted to share the honor with her fellow-fantasy and sci-fi writers, who have for so long watched “the beautiful awards,” like the one she’d just received, go to the “so-called realists.” Then she continued:

Thank you Neil, and to the givers of this beautiful reward, my thanks from the heart. My family, my agent, editors, know that my being here is their doing as well as mine, and that the beautiful reward is theirs as much as mine. And I rejoice at accepting it for, and sharing it with, all the writers who were excluded from literature for so long, my fellow authors of fantasy and science fiction—writers of the imagination, who for the last 50 years watched the beautiful rewards go to the so-called realists.

I think hard times are coming when we will be wanting the voices of writers who can see alternatives to how we live now and can see through our fear-stricken society and its obsessive technologies to other ways of being, and even imagine some real grounds for hope. We will need writers who can remember freedom. Poets, visionaries—the realists of a larger reality.

Right now, I think we need writers who know the difference between the production of a market commodity and the practice of an art. Developing written material to suit sales strategies in order to maximize corporate profit and advertising revenue is not quite the same thing as responsible book publishing or authorship. (Thank you, brave applauders.)

Yet I see sales departments given control over editorial; I see my own publishers in a silly panic of ignorance and greed, charging public libraries for an ebook six or seven times more than they charge customers. We just saw a profiteer try to punish a publisher for disobedience and writers threatened by corporate fatwa, and I see a lot of us, the producers who write the books, and make the books, accepting this. Letting commodity profiteers sell us like deodorant, and tell us what to publish and what to write. (Well, I love you too, darling.)

Books, you know, they’re not just commodities. The profit motive often is in conflict with the aims of art. We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art—the art of words.

I have had a long career and a good one. In good company. Now here, at the end of it, I really don’t want to watch American literature get sold down the river. We who live by writing and publishing want—and should demand—our fair share of the proceeds. But the name of our beautiful reward is not profit. It’s name is freedom.

Thank you.

[thanks to parkerhiggins.net for the transcription of her speech.]

Sticking a Finger in Their Eye

There's a new ad on TV from Ama - er, um SPECTRE - touting their newly updated reading gizmo. You see a carefully chosen variety of 'civilians' sitting in a 'pseudo-living space', with fake walls and big chairs and they're reading on this flat piece of techonology and are simply ecstatic about the experience.

No, they're not reading books. They're reading files on a computer...

The camera pulls back at the end to show this little staged area is right in front of one of New York City's icons, the Flatiron Building. You'll recognize it - it is triangular but seems to be pretty flat, leaving you wondering what the offices and hallways inside it are like. It sits on a wedge of land point north, where Broadway and 5^th Avenue intersect. This is mid-way between Wall Street and Central Park, pretty much dead center of the publishing center of the United States.

Coincidence?

Now - think back to the big lawsuit where the US government sued Apple and a raft of major publishers for collusion in setting e-book prices in an attempt to stop Ama - er, SPECTRE - from completely monopolizing the e-book market. And here's an ad about the wonders and joys of e-reading staged in the heart of American publishing.

Coincidence?

One last bit of this that eliminates any question of coincidence: the Flatiron Building is the home of St. Martin's Press, one of those publishers charged of collusion and the one more vociferously resisting to settlement, and most adamant about the dangers of what Ama - er, um SPECTRE was doing to publishing.

No, no coindence.

Just a bully sticking a finger into the eye of a foe.

The Right Artwork

The most recent reissue from Rue Morgue Press came in today. The title is one of Bill Farley's all-time favorites. They've done it justice with a terrific cover.

They're a class act!

Class Acts

With his new book, The Black Box, Michael Connelly marks two decades worth of Harry Bosch novels. To celebrate this landmark, his publisher put together this poster featuring covers of the books from around the world. The poster was also signed by Michael (you can see his silver signature at the right edge down toward the bottom.

Very classy: for the publisher to go through the time and expense of creating, printing and sending out these posters and for Michael for taking his time to sign them.

Thanks to Michael Connelly and his publisher, Little Brown, for 20 years of Harry Bosch!

Do The Kobo!

As you may have heard, we Indiebound stores are changing our e-book sales from Google to Kobo. We're very excited!

First of all, let us reassure those of you who have purchased Google e-books that your books are still – and to the best of our knowledge – will always be available to you. Thank you for your purchases!

But there are several things about Kobo that we believe will be better for us and for you:

1. Kobo is an international distributor. Unlike some readers, you can buy e-books for one of its readers from anywhere in the world, not just the US. It is a global system.

2. You can buy Kobo e-books for any e-reader (except, of course, Kindles).

3. Kobo has won the “Wired” award for best device, awared by the highly respected tech magazine, Wired. You know that's a good thing.

4. We will be selling the actual readers as well as e-books! That's right, you can purchase any of the four types of Kobo e-readers directly from us, and when you do, we automatically get credit for all your purchases, so you're supporting us AND enjoying quality e-reading. Click here to see the specs on the Kobo choices.)

5. The device prices are sweet. The least expensive is the Mini, at $79.99, and the most expensive will be the Arc tablet, which tops out at $249.99. At first, there are just the Mini and the Glow ($129), and the next two types will be coming possibly as soon as next month, certainly early next year.

6. Kobo is dedicated to books, unlike Google which obviously is interested in everything. We believe that Kobo will provide a more stable platform for your e-reading, and that their tech support is going to be much more available to you, although we'll do our best to help you out as best we can, should you run into a problem.

7. Kobo gives back. They have a program you can sign up for that will track the hours you spend reading on their devices and will convert them into a contribution to the literary organization of your choice. They really DO support reading!

There's going to be a time of transition, but ABA is working with us and Kobo to make this transition as seamless as possible. We may even have everything up and running as soon as next week! We'll have a display case with two types of the readers available for your perusal here at the shop in the not-too-distant future.

We'll have the Mini and the Glo here for you, but we'll have information on the Touch and the Arc available here in the store and on our website.

It's not too early to reserve a reader for a holiday gift, even though we're not ready to place the device in your hands. But remember, it's always better to reserve one in advance than wait till the last minute! We look forward to this new partnership, and we hope you will too!

Self publishing and us

More and more frequently, we're asked by self-published authors to host signings for their books. We can't accomodate everyone, so we set up some rules, and they're not necessarily popular ones, but they're the ones we decided best help us winnow the field. And it's an impressive field!

According to Bowker , there are more than 235,000 self-published titles released every year. That's a whole lot of writing to have to narrow down! Granted, some are digital releases, so that's the immediate and first cut; obviously we can't host signings for digital books. But don't forget that there are a lot of digital books that are becoming print books, and when they do, our rules have to apply.

First, it has to be a mystery. I know, you'd think that would be obvious, but you might be surprised at how often we're contacted by self-published authors asking us to stock their books only to be hurt when we point out that we're a specialty shop and their romantic memoir of a talking badger just doesn't fit with who we are. Turn the badger into a detective and we'll talk.

But then, there are other rules, and we're serious about them. We'll only consider a self-published title if it's offered by one of the big wholesalers (Ingram is the first one folks go to, but Baker & Taylor works just as well), if it falls within industry standard discount (40% -- we have to cover our overhead to stay in business so that you'll have a place to sign), and if it's returnable (we always hope to sell through, but realisitically? It may not happen). Those three are non-negotiable. These guidlines are not meant to be mean. They're fiscal.

It's this combination that proves to be problematic. Books will be offered at the wholesalers for a reduced discount, and then authors tell us their publishers will give us a better deal, and that's great, but if we don't sell through and can return them to said publisher, that means we may have a credit with someone that we'll never use, so it's still money out of pocket. That's  why we want to get the copies from a wholesaler - if we have to return some books, we can use the credit for a future order.

And remember, there's 235,000 titles out there. Every year. And that number is growing. Other stores have come up with different criteria for their handling of self-published authors, and ours may change over time, but this is where we're at.

Authors, if you're self-published and want us to carry your book and/or have you in for a signing, here's what we need from you in your very first contact email:

~ Give us your published name (if it's different from your email name), the title of your book, who the publisher is, what the price is, the binding or format, and who distributes it. Also give us a small synopsis, just a paragraph or two. You can add a link to your website, but if that's all you provide, we won't click through. You have to be willing to do a little work to promote your book. If you won't, why should we?

~ Do not, ever, tell us to read the reviews on Amazon. In fact, don't mention them at all. We're indies; we've been fighting Amazon all along. Our stance is pretty solidly on record. If you use Amazon as your selling point, you don't need or want us. A lot of our fellow indies will simply delete your enquiry email unread if you link to Amazon. We're not saying that you shouldn't sell your book through Amazon; obviously it's financially imperative for you to do so. But we're not interested in partnering with them. We're not interested in you if you're promoting Amazon as the last word and source of your book. We want to help you, but we won't help them.

~ Which brings up another point: we do not and will not stock books published by Amazon. If your book is published by Thomas & Mercer, sorry, we will not support it or agree to a signing.

~  If your book isn't carried through the wholesalers but you have an innovative way of approaching the discount and returnability criteria, we can talk. We're flexible on a lot of levels, but you have to bring the solution to the table.

~ If we come to an agreement, it's your responsibility, dear author, to make sure your friends and family know that they can buy your books from us. FYI, if you give away your book to your family and friends, you're not doing yourself a service. This is your immediate buying base. They love you, they should be willing to support you, and they should be doing that by buying at full price. You don't become a paid and successful author by undercutting yourself. So have them call us and reserve the book to be sure we have enough on hand. If they buy it somewhere else, say somewhere on-line that discounts, and think it is perfectly fine to bring it to our signing with you they are terribly wrong. If we have you in to sign books, it is to sell our books. Please be clear with your friends and family on that. Don't undercut yourself or us!  The best way to be invited back for a signing for your second book is to help us sell a large number of copies at your signing. Make sense? We think so.

~ And lastly, be polite. There are 235,000 of you out there and there are four of us. We will work with you if you follow the rules, but insulting us is a certain way to insure that your book will never be stocked. Actually, that's true of any author, not just self-published ones.

Keep in mind that we've been at this for two decades. We've dealt with hundreds of authors, from rookies to Big Names. We're pleased for you that you've published a book, but then so have 234,999 other people this year, and they all want what you want. What will impress us and encourage us to work with you will be your professionalism, your serious intentions, your concern for what works for those selling your books, and your demeanor. Demanding divas are a dime a dozen. Do not for an instant believe or act as if you are owed a signing because you have self-published a book. We very well may be able to help you sell your books. But you have to believe we know what we're doing, and we're good at it. It'll be worth your time to hear what we say and work with us to our mutual benefit. 

We want to be your biggest fans and ally in bookselling; help us out with that.

 - Fran

Book madness

One of our points of pride here at SMB is our care and love of the books we sell. We always try to have first editions of new books, especially the signed ones, and we are so meticulously finicky about condition that we've driving our sales reps and publicists in New York frantic with our demands of replacement copies and new dust jackets.

We're funny like that. We're all about the books, and admit it, that's why you love us!

So imagine the various words that went through our heads when we saw these:

 

 

 

However!

We are pleased to announce that despite those horrific boxes, duct tape and all, the copies of the new Gillian Flynn novel, Gone Girl (Crown, $25.00) are here, and they're signed firsts!

Best of all? They're in not-totally-awful shape? Which means we're sighing but honestly? They're in good shape, and considering everything, we're tickled!

 

 

The Vulture Capitalist Game

Now that our battle with Amazon has hit the front page of the Seattle Times, allow me to highlight the background of all of this in order to explain a few things to those who have not been following it for the last few months.

First of all, this is not simply a matter of Nancy Pearl’s new gig. She’s just the latest name that allows us to put a face to the math of Amazon’s game. The first blog post we did on the subject dates to June 22, 2011. This covered the back and forth between me and an author who was publishing through Amazon and wanted to have a signing. I said no and explained why. This post contains his message to me and my reply, as well as a few other thoughts.

This turned into a frenzy when it was picked up and mentioned by a few other book-related blogs and resulted in a number of additional posts in which I quoted and answered point raised by readers. It has always been my intention that the point of all of these posts is to enlighten and educate people who don’t know the nitty-gritty of the book world. At the bottom of that June 22 blog (Can’t Shake the Devil’s Hand and Say You’re Only Kidding) are links to the subsequent entries. [You can also find the blogs grouped under the category Bookselling These Days and they touch on more issues than what is being raised in this blog.]

On July 10, 2011, I tried to explain the math that is at the heart of the mess. Please read it for yourself – if you have read the recent post about Nancy Pearl, you’ll see that I was pointing out the problems with the math nearly six months ago, but what held true then for the McBains holds true for the Pearls. The post of Oct 7, 2011 deals with yet a different author but ties into the math. This post explains Amazon’s position about selling to other booksellers.

Dec 8, 2011’s post concerns Amazon’s app that would allow anyone with a smart phone to scan an item and check the price against Amazon’s. In effect, as many pointed out, it turned any brick-and-mortar shop into a showroom for Amazon – an outfit without a place where you can go in and handle the merchandise. The app did not apply to books but we saw it as yet another challenge to independents/small businesses as a whole and an unfair business practice.

On Dec 16, 2011, I constructed a post of various stories about Amazon’s business practices to try to show the greater problem and to convey that this isn’t just petty crankiness on what they’ve done to books and bookselling. These sorts of stories continue to appear. The latest that we saw this past week was about plagiarism and the wholesale passing off of another author’s e-book as your own through Amazon and whether Amazon is or will do anything about it.

There is still the issue of our ordering Amazon’s books and selling them at full price anyway. Why not do that? We could, sure, and have in a few instances, reluctantly. It financially supports a corporation that we think is fundamentally bad for our industry. Don recently posted a comment on our blog: “I understand that Amazon is really hurting independent bookshops, and I could understand not stocking their books because you don't want to send any money to your competition, but to be honest, Amazon isn't going away, and your existence is dependent on your ability to provide the things that Amazon doesn't have: readings, ambience, personal service, and a hand-curated selection of great books instead of a massive virtual barnload of every book in existence.” I’m glad that he grasps that but he also then misses an important thing: those things that we provide – readings, ambience, our recommendations and newsletter, even this blog – all go away if people don’t support it though buying books from independent businsses. Amazon’s deep discounts are then a threat to what he says he cherishes in an independent. It isn’t really a pickle, Don – support that which you want to enjoy, pay for what you use and, if you don’t, don’t say “Gee, that’s too bad, I used to shop there all the time” when Amazon is picking clean the bones of small businesses across the nation.

To be clear, we have special ordered a couple of these Amazon books for long-time customers. We won’t stock them not only for financial reasons but because that would also give Amazon a tiny slice of advertising through the spine of the book on our shelf. We reject the accusations that this is censorship. As pointed out in one of the earlier posts, there are all sorts of books that we choose to not carry – some just don’t sell well or at all, some just sound dumb or uninteresting, and some may claim to be ‘mysteries’ but the solution to a crime is not the central point of the book so we bypass them. And then there is the fact that we’re a specialty shop so there is a wide range of styles, genres and topics that we don’t stock. No bookshop stocks everything. Maybe Amazon says they do, but then they’re not a bookshop.

So you can see that we’ve been writing about this for months, long before Pearl joined forces with Amazon. I hope you'll take the time to read through these past posts to see what points have been raised, what issues have been addressed and what concerns have been aired.

According to the article that appeared in this morning’s Seattle Times, she laughed when told of what I’d said. Gallows humor – who knew it would tickle her!

Why us, why me, why should we speak out? Well, someone has to. What is going on is wrong.This is not just about Nancy Pearl, the Seattle Mystery Bookshop and Seattle. This is far bigger than just these little pieces. I’m insulated, somewhat. I have a specialty bookshop and Pearl hasn’t done much with mystery or crime or thriller books. She’s stuck mostly to children’s and general fiction. Those independents who have benefited from her past efforts have been the general bookshops. It is clear and understandable that they, along with publishers and other book-industry figures, would fear angering her. But I can say that I’ve talked to sales reps, booksellers and publishers and, while no one feels safe raising their voices, everyone tells me to keep at it. I hope that more of my colleagues will begin to speak up about all of this. It is something upon which we cannot stand silent. It is too important. 

If you agree with me, speak up.

~JB

Pearls Before Swine? The Joker in the Game

We've covered the economics of Amazon in the past but it seems worth repeating. The general public does not realize how it works. So this is how it works:

Throughout the publishing industry, the standard discount is 40%. That means that we order a book and we pay 60% of the cover price to the vendor (publisher or wholesaler). Usually we get a higher discount ordering from the publisher. From the wholesalers there is normally a sliding scale - you get a slightly higher discount if you order more copies. But you can take the 40% as the norm.

Out of the 40% that we make when we sell the book, we pay the rent, payroll, pay for the actual books, and all of the other bills that any business has. That 40% is the 'profit'. The higher the discount, the more you make because you keep more of the sale. In bookselling, that does not mean 3 martini lunches, an account at Tiffany's or a new interior for the DeLorean, it means you can be a little less in debt to the vendors because that 60% we have to pay them can add up quickly.

For the last 20 years or so, the book world has been ruled by discounts to buyers, to customers, not to booksellers. When the Big Box stores began, they'd offer, for example, the books on The New York Times' bestseller list at 30% off the cover price. They were not making much money on the sale of the book but they could afford that for a variety of reason (they had corporate money behind them, they relied on volume sales to make up the 'loss leaders' that brought people into the joint, and they were paid by the publishers to display books in prominent locations to encourage sales, etc.). Independents couldn't match those reduced prices because, well, you have to have that 40% 'profit' to pay. Those who tried to do the same price cutting often ended up cutting their own throats.

OK, so now Amazon is begining to publish books and people (and authors who want to have signings with us) want to know if we'll stock the Amazon-published books. The answer is no. It would be financial suicide to do so.

For an example, let's take Nancy Pearl. She's published a number of books about books. We used to stock them to support her and to support a local author and because they were fun and different and popular.

Her first book, Book Lust, has a retain price of $16.95. If we order it at a 40% discount, we pay $10.17 for it and make $6.78 if it sells. Once again, that 'profit' of $6.78 (hardly what Bain Capital makes, but we're not in the "1%") goes toward the rent, a new belt for the vacuum cleaner, bubblewrap for mail orders, pencils for the bookkeepers and M&Ms for the machine on the front counter. However, if you order Book Lust from Amazon, you pay only $10.29 - a 39% savings. That means that you can buy a copy of the book from them for nearly what we pay for it. How can we compete with that? We can't and won't try.

The announcement on Jan 11th, 2012, that the former librarian has joined forces with Amazon to launch a publishing line of her favorite books that, up to now, have been out of print will no doubt cause much headscratching. We don't know yet if any of her favorites will be mysteries so this may not come into play with us, but it will bedevil other independents as Amazon's mystery imprints have bedeviled us. We will not stock their mystery books. Will general independents stock her new line of reissues?

Here's the math:

One of the first books to be released is Merle Miller's A Gay and Meloncholy Sound (we know nothing about this book and have just picked it as an example). Amazon notes that it will be available on April 2nd at a list price of $14.95. However, they're selling it for $8.97, a 40% savings. You save $5.98. If you buy the e-book version for Kindle (something you cannot do through us), you pay only $5.99. You see, they're not only undercutting any other bookseller, they're also undercutting themselves their own publications. [The other title announced as part of Pearl's new gig is Rhian Ellis' After Life and the math - discount, retail price/Kindle price, etc - are identical, so this is Amazon's standard, similar to their other publishing lines.]

Thus, it is uneconomical for us to stock and sell printed books published by Amazon and we believe it would be financially pointless for any independent to do so. (And, again, while we can sell e-books through our new website, no one but Amazon can sell the versions for Kindle - that is proprietary) If you can't realistically make money selling something, why stock it? You can't and expect to keep your business healthy. "Pointless" really doesn't capture it, though. It would be financially destructive to stock Amazon's books. They've already stacked the deck against us. It isn't just that the odds always favor the house. It is more that, when playing with Amazon, there is no deck, the dice are so loaded they're heavy, the house has no doorknobs on the inside and the joker is shuffling the cards.

There is no way to win so we don't sit down at the table.

If it is uneconomical for independents to sell books published by Amazon, and no one but Amazon can sell e-books for Kindle, and if those two facts mean that the audience for Amazon's books is automatically limited, what is the attraction of working with Amazon for someone like Nancy Pearl?  She has more to lose from this alliance than gain.

She can no longer continue to be accepted as an objective and impartial promoter of books for by joining forces with a single and controversial player in the book world - one that is both a major retailer and now a publisher - her stance is now tainted.

She's no longer going to be simply a librarian; she's now a publisher and, as such, cannot be viewed as objective. No publisher is. And, by being affiliated with Amazon, she's lending her 'brand' to them and can no longer be viewed as free agent. No matter what she recommends from now on, the appearance, suspicion or assumption will always be, fair or not, that Amazon is calling -- or at least influencing -- her shots.

Very sad. It's like hearing a favorite old song used on a car commercial. You can never listen to it the same again. It's no longer just a great song - it's been reduced to a jingle.

Spawn of Point/CounterPoint

Emme B wrote:

I’ve been following this thread since it started. I keep going back and forth on adding my two cents to the conversation (really there is no monetary value if someone is counting). This post keeps eating at me though. It's an invaluable commodity to have someone in your community available to help recommend books based on their knowledge of what books and authors exist as well as what a persons' specific likes and dislikes might be. I agree. We need to support those stores. My concern, and what's eating at me -- if you aren't going to recommend books to me -- no matter how much I'd like reading them -- based on who published the book -- or any other reason based on factors external to the quality of the book -- I'm not sure I'd trust that I was getting the best possible recommendation. I’m sure it’s a better experience visiting your bookstore than it is to utilize an online seller or a giant box store that employs people better at making coffee than they are at recommending books -- but I think integrity is an important quality for those precious few bookstores that can offer quality recommendations. For my experience, you've lost some of that integrity by refusing to work with one publisher -- no matter how valid the reason.

JB counters:

It is odd to me that so many people are having a hard time accepting that any given bookseller will make decisions to not stock this book or that book for any number of reasons. That we’re a specialty shop right away tells anyone that we’re going to be stocking, recommending and selling a narrow selection of books. That specialty shops can and do exist does not seem to be problematic. That we don’t carry military history, animal husbandry, atlases, photo books on the Royal Wedding or political tracts on the viability of communes doesn’t seem to rile people.

Similarly, there are authors we do not stock because they do not sell well –or at all – for us. That’s a financial judgment. To stock them all would tie up cash flow and shelf space, so we don’t. Some of these authors sell well in general shops or corporate shops, but not for us. No one seems to question this. Similarly, we’ve decided to not stock Harper’s new, expensive trade paperback editions of Agatha Christie. We have plenty of her books in used mass market for 1/3 the price. The $12.99 copies won’t sell well. Why tie up money in them? If someone else was publishing the McBain backlist, we probably wouldn’t stock them either. But, yes, we won’t stock the Amazon copies. It is ok to not stock particular books from Harper but not ok to stock books from Amazon? That makes no sense.

But if we publicly announce that we’re not going to stock an author due to the publisher, that seems to be a problem. If you’ve been following the thread, you’ve read comments from publishers who have written about Amazon’s unreasonable demands for terms. You’ve read other booksellers write about how Amazon has damaged their businesses. You’ve read our points that we’re not refusing to carry these books due to the author or the quality of the writing – only because of the predatory corporate practices of his publisher. This is not censorship. We’re not prohibiting the publication of the book. We’re just saying it would not be in our financial interests – short term and long term – to carry the books.

As for integrity, that’s a value judgment in the eye of the viewer. Most of the response we’ve gotten has been congratulatory for showing the integrity to not stock Amazon books. Is there no integrity in standing up for your views in the face of ridicule? - and that takes us to Jacob

Jacob wrote:

After reading all these comments, I've decided to never buy from independent stores again. You don't like Amazon, fine, but taking it out on the authors who are the most important part of the entire chain, is unforgivable. I don't care where a writer publishes as long as I can get the book. Readers, Books Store owners, and publishers should be kissing the ass of every author who graces you with a book. Learn your place people.

JB counters:

And where just is our ‘place’? Because we're booksellers, we're now second-class citizens, mere servants to you who know better? Perhaps we should no longer be allowed to vote? 

And as for not caring who the publisher is, if this particular author was being published by the National Socialistic Party Press and I refused to do business with them, would you feel the same? You’d really pay money to ANY publisher to get a book no matter if they underwrote child prostitution or the abolition of integrated marriage? If so, more power to you.

Joan wrote:

You are effectively banning books as well as depriving your customers of the works of those writers. That's sad.

JB counters:

No – we’re banning nothing. We’re saying it is financial dangerous for us to stock them. If you want to buy one, go ahead.

However, if you wanted to buy an e-version of this book, we couldn’t sell it to you. Amazon has that as proprietory. If you want to buy a copy for your Kindle, you have to buy from Amazon. Are they banning books if they do not allow other booksellers to sell their authors’ e-books? They have a monopoly and we're not supporting it. And we're the bad guys?

Beth D wrote:

You are absolutely attacking authors. You boasted about pulling ALL the books off your shelves by any author who dared publish with Amazon. God forbid these people (you know, the ones with the talent) refuse to be used and discarded by the NY publishers, and instead team up with a publisher who knows how to sell books. You need to support authors and not publishers. They are the ones who matter.

JB counters:

There is nothing I can say to change your mind. But you’re dead-on that we need to support authors. We do. We stock books by authors from small presses, authors who have printed the books themselves, authors whose books are out of print but who have copies and sell them to us so that we can introduce them to new readers, as well as authors whose books are published by specialty presses and the major publishers. We also order copies from overseas when US versions are no longer in print. We have signings with first-time authors and international bestsellers and we treat them all the same. (With a quick count I came up with 34 formal signings between Jan 1st and June 30th. In there were a number of stock signings as well as signed copies bought from self-published authors.)

But, in this one case, Beth, we agree – we’re not supporting this particular publisher.

D.N wrote:

…That said, JB, how can bookstores make getting books something more than just cruising in and grabbing said title off the shelf and swiping the debit card? I've asked myself this question every time I see these discussions. I love bookstores. I find them both peaceful and stimulating. They are generally just great spaces to hang out in. How can bookstores make the extra investment more appealing? Of course, being a specialty bookshop, you have a clientele of dedicated readers, who will always shop there, because you cater to their dedication, which is something an online presence like Amazon can't really duplicate no matter what their algorithms are. But how do bookstores do this for the more general reader?...

JB answers:

To be honest, I cannot fathom how a small, general independent bookseller can do it. I look through the publishers’ catalogs and see the mind-numbing selection of books and I do not know how they decide to order and stock this book but not that book. They have to know their customers and what their customers go for. They have to know that a yet another new diet book is probably a waste of time and money or not, and, really, now many memoirs by politicians who are planning a run at the presidency do they need?  How many copies of a new book about Princess Diana are realistically worth carrying?

And, if they’re worth their salt, they’ll be quick to special order what their customers want that they don’t have – just like us. We order non-mysteries for our regulars all the time. You cannot have it all in the shop at the exact moment it is needed. You have to have understanding customers.

And, to be sure, there are people who open bookshops who are not booksellers. It takes passion and care and to some un-teachable degree, an innate ability to hand-sell books. Not everyone can do it. (Similarly, some authors are spectacularly good at selling themselves and their books – some are terrible.) It takes effort and time. Opening a bookshop is not a quiet, calm relaxing way to make a living. You have to work hard to make it look easy.

But the other part of the equation is that you, the customer, have to patronize the small independent. I would say that the vast majority of small independents who have closed in the last decade were forced to because their customers abandoned them. It takes effort on your part to – to get dressed, to make the trip, to talk to the booksellers, to spend more money there than if you stayed home, in your pajamas, to order on-line. Yes, you can save a lot of money ordering on-line. But if you do that you can’t shake your head and say what a pity the corner bookseller is gone. You, the reader and buyer, have to sacrifice convenience and price if having small businesses matter to you. If you don’t help them, you’re part of the reason they’re no longer around.

A successful independent bookshop should be a partnership between their loyal customers and the booksellers. But it takes both sides for it to work. If the customers stop coming in, it doesn’t matter how good the booksellers are, the shop will close.

If you don’t care that independents are vanishing, do nothing. Keep ordering from the corporate sites. If you want your independents to survive, the best thing you can do is spend your money with them.

Can't Shake the Devil's Hand and Say You're Only Kidding

This week, we received a copy of a new book from an author who was interested in coming in to sign. The problem is that the book is from the new Amazon mystery imprint. They're making an agressive move into publishing and have lined up a list of new and known authors. The authors are understandably eager and excited and they have a hard time understanding when they run into our brick wall of NO. We start with my original message of explaination, then his reply and my return message. In the interest of everyone getting a better understanding of the issues and our point, here is the exchange ~ JB

Tuesday, June 21, 10:30 AM To: The Author

Sorry to say that we cannot offer you a signing. We cannot do anything to support, help or benefit Amazon. They're the enemy of independent bookshops and aiding them in any way - mainly ordering their books and selling them and promoting them - would be suicide. Things are tough enough without cutting our own throats. - JB Dickey, owner

Tuesday, June 21, 2011 5:49 PM To: [email protected]

Dear JB, I understand your concerns. But please know that the opposite is happening nationwide. Amazon is reaching out to independents everywhere and offering to send hundreds of thousands of Amazon emails promoting an individual bookstore. Happily sending Amazon customers to independents. The results have been spectacular. Hundreds have been showing up at these events. It is a tremendous show of support for the independents.

I know it seems counter-intuitive. Amazon is easy to demonize. But I've seen the result of their work with independents. And it is impressive. They wouldn't be putting in this kind of effort if they were out to cut your throat. My little book tour is not about to make or break Amazon. I truly believe that Amazon wants both the independents and the online stores to thrive. If I didn't believe that I would not have signed with them.

And as an author with a bestselling book from a conventional NY publisher, I can attest to the new life Amazon is breathing into books. Whereas an event might bring in the same ten or twelve people, now we are seeing many times that amount. New customers who then tell others about the event and about the bookstores. It has been great for everyone, especially the bookstores.

I know your mind is set, and I do not expect my email to change it. But I do want you to know that my experience with Amazon as an author has been second to none. They are incredibly supportive and responsive and beyond author-friendly. They flew me to NY for a book signing at BEA, something unheard of for a first-time author in my genre. And the list goes on.

If I can do anything to help your bookstore please let me know. And if you want to talk more about this or anything else book-related please call me at 555-555-1212. The author I am touring with is an English professor at University State X, and I know he feels as strongly as I do about the survival of the independents.

Sincerely, The Author

6/22/11, 10:56 AM To: The Author

What you say is all well and good but you're looking at it from your perspective.

From my perspective, this is a huge corporation that has not only taken massive amounts of sales away from me over the years but also sales reps (which means the attention of publishers) and has waged a price war with the NYC publishers over their e-books. Remember when they removed ALL St. Martin's titles from their site in retaliation for St. Martin's insisting that they no longer undercut the price structure for e-books that the others were observing? Remember, too, that Amazon is the company that reached into the private devices of individuals and deleted e-books (one of our very good/long time customers is a computer worker and had downloaded a technical book from Amazon and make copious notes in her reader - Amazon deleted the 'book' and she lost all of her notes/ and then they also deleted - what was it, 1984? - from people's e-readers). And let's not forget that they appeared to buckle to outside pressure to remove gay and lesbian fiction and, when caught, blamed technical problems, not mendacity. I cannot tolerate censorship of any kind or by anyone. If these people are not intentionally evil, they come damn close to it by their actions and policies.

You want me to buy books from them? Pay them money to continue their efforts and to have books in my joint that clearly say "Amazon", to give them free advertisement as well?

If they're like NYC publishers, they'd demand that I open an account with them. That means giving them my personal info (this shop is a sole-proprietorship), tax numbers and bank accounts and, probably, the account information from three other businesses (either publishers and/or wholesalers) as references. Sorry - not a chance in hell I'd give all of that to Amazon. I do not trust them.

Even if I were to consider it, I haven't heard enough about their policies: what is the discount structure? are returns allowed and in what time frame? are they selling the same book at a discount that I can't/won't match or are they selling the books at the same price as I would?

I don't doubt that they're doing good things for you authors. It is fully within their interest to do so. First of all, they're launching a mystery/crime imprint and want to do all they can to promote it and its authors. Secondly, they want you to promote it and talk about it and to have more authors want to sign with them and to make more and more sales. I would bet that the intent is to take more and more business away from the major publishers who are very good at letting sales slip through their fingers.

Neither of us will change our minds. I'm the owner of the Bailey Brothers Building and Loan. You are working for Mr. Potter. And Mr. Potter is always buying.

No one else may share my views. We're all doggedly independent. It might be that I'm extra-sensitive about Amazon since they started here. If it works for others and you, great. But it is not for me.  ~ JB

Update, June 29th:  Folks - if you're interested in following this debate, please read the blog posts that followed to see our answers to many of the questions raised by commentators. What you've just read is but the tip of the iceberg around which independents must navigate ~JB

the morning of June 23: On Dave's Thoughts

the afternoon of June 23: Point/CounterPoint

June 24: the Return of Point/CounterPoint

June 29: Spawn of Point/CounterPoint

July 3: Point/CounterPoint vs. Mothra

July 10: Point/Counterpoint: a story problem

Aug 8: Point/Counterpoint: It Isn't Just Us