Today, I picked up Diane Duane’s novel Omnitopia Dawn from my public library, after placing a hold via the web. It’s a hardcover print book, which is much less useful to me than an e-book. I could read an e-book at work, between calls, on my day job (at least, if it were a DRM-free e-book), thanks to Ibis Reader. I’ll have to read a print book at home, on my own free time that I could be using for something else (such as writing here).
If the e-book had been reasonably priced, I would have bought it instead—even if I only expected I’d want to read it once, the added convenience would have been worth a few bucks to me. However, the e-book is $11.99, a price that Amazon proudly declaims was set by the publisher. The printed hardcover book is only $9.60, and the paperback is $7.99.
I might have paid $9.60 for an e-book, would more likely have paid $7.99, and I would almost certainly have paid $5-6 for it, but I’m not going to pay $11.99 for one—especially with the print book, the physical artifact that costs more money to print, store, and ship, costing less. That’s ridiculous.
What does that mean? It means Diane Duane’s publisher, Penguin (and, regrettably, Duane herself, who I like a whole lot), has lost a sale from me. They’ve lost several bucks I would otherwise have been willing to pay them for the privilege of reading an e-book once. They could have lost this sale to piracy—but they didn’t need to. I can check the book out from the library a lot more legally than I could pirate it, and either way it will be just as read.
Admittedly, if I pirated it I’d still have the e-book file on my hard drive afterward for rereading down the road, but any time in which I might want to reread a book is years away and if I don’t like the book I wouldn’t be rereading it anyway. Either way, my immediate need, and the thing that would have driven me to spend the money, has been satisfied by other means.
I’ll grant that if I like Omnitopia Dawn enough to want to read its sequels, I might possibly buy it and/or those sequels down the road, if the price becomes more reasonable—but by the time value of money formula I learned in economics class, a few bucks now would be more valuable to the publisher and Duane than the same amount then.
I have bought several e-books at $5-6 each over the last month or so, from Baen and even from B&N, including Duane’s entire Young Wizards series—all but the last Young Wizards books by Duane were about $5.50 each, and I even went ahead and shelled out the full $9.99 for the last Young Wizards e-book because I wanted to read it now. But $12 for an e-book that doesn’t even have that latest-book-in-series cachet? That’s ridiculous.
To reiterate, I will pay $5-6 even for an e-book I only expect to want to read once, especially if it’s from an author I like. I’ll buy it mostly to read it now, but partly on the chance that, in a few years, I might want to revisit it and read it one more time or even more. $5-6 seems like a reasonable price for a few hours of enjoyment now (especially compared to movie costs these days) plus the promise of the same amount of enjoyment a few years down the line. I’ll even pay up to $10 for something I really really want to read right away. (Omnitopia Dawn doesn’t qualify since it’s the first book in a series I have no attachments to as yet—even if it were the paperback price of $7.99 I’m not sure I’d buy it.)
I’m not going to pay $12 for it, especially when the hardcover or paperback book versions (which I can legally loan to friends, or sell used to recoup part of my investment) are so much cheaper. And I’m not going to buy a dead-tree version even for a cheaper amount because the dead-tree version is of limited utility to me. Aside from being able to read it in fewer places, I don’t want the millstone around my neck of another paper book to clutter up my apartment and get lost in the clutter.
I want an e-book I can keep on my hard drive where I always know where it is, I can back up to keep safe, and I can read anywhere I want to. But I’m not going to pay a ridiculous price for that utility. Whatever happened to publishers’ promises that agency prices for e-books would keep pace with the lowest price of the printed book, being marked down when the printed book was available in paperback? (I suppose that since this didn’t happen in the era of eReader and Fictionwise, I shouldn’t be too surprised at it not happening now either.)
This isn’t meant as a knock at Diane Duane, who has always set quite reasonable e-book prices (and also been very reasonable on the subject of DRM) when allowed to do so herself, and has little to no control over what price her publishers choose to charge. But I want to point out to that publisher that it is costing itself, and her, money with its ridiculous pricing policies.
Publishers had better get their acts together. Even if it’s less convenient, the print library is still free.
“Whatever happened to publishers’ promises that agency prices for e-books would keep pace with the lowest price of the printed book, being marked down when the printed book was available in paperback?”
It was, to use a technical (rather than an accurate-but-profane) term, a bald-faced lie, told deliberately and with malice in an effort to sucker the naive into acceptance. This was clear to a lot of people at the time, and a year later, sad to say, they’ve been proven entirely correct.
Good for you, Chris. I have moved the items in my Kindle wish list on Amazon into several separate wish lists, including one for overpriced Kindle books and one for Agency e-books. From these lists I’ll only buy e-books that I’m desperate to have (in other words, probably none). I refuse to buy overpriced digital content. (I’m also not going to be on nytimes.com much anymore, apparently.)
Note that the paperback isn’t available yet – it’s due to be published in August. This is why the ebook is more expensive that the paperback.
But I agree in general. Having the new hardback cheaper to buy than the ebook is silly, no matter what the reason for it. (In this case, it’s because Amazon are allowed to discount the hardback, and get a very generous 50-65% discount on the RRP.)
Amazon seem willing to sell most paper books for a margin of 10-20% of the selling price. It’s plainly ridiculous that they get 30% for the ebooks.
It only stands to reason that ebooks should be cheaper than regular books because you don’t have the publishing costs. Yes, they still have to be published for the other versions, but for those who buy the ebooks, you should get a deal for saving the publisher money.
If I remember the story correctly the publishers said that to sell an ebook cheaper than the paperback would cause the author’s words to be devalued and we couldn’t have that.
I use ereader IQ to track the price of ebooks. Before ebooks there were alway books that I wanted to read but but not at hard cover prices so I would wait for the paperback. With ereader IQ this became easy with ebooks. I just waited for the paperback to come out and I would buy the ebook at paperback prices.
About three to four months ago I noticed a big change. Paperback versions were coming out but there was no corresponding drop in ebook prices. This was across all of the publishers.
If the story was ebook prices had to be high to protect the worth of the authors words and the publishers have discounted the worth of those words by dropping the price when the paperback came out, what is justifying the extra worth of those words in an ebook? And why did all of the big publishers make the same decision within months of each other?
I just don’t buy the story and definately don’t buy those books. There is always something that is cheaper that I want to read.
I dislike the high prices of some eBooks as much as the next guy, but in this particular example the eBook is technically cheaper than the print version. The hardcover has a list price of $24.95 and is being discounted by Amazon right now to a street price of $13.59 which is more expensive than the eBook. You can’t compare a paperback that doesn’t exist right now and I’d guess Penguin will drop the eBook price in August when the paperback is actually available (I know some pubs fail to do this, but Penguin’s been better than others) and it will be either $7.99 or $6.99 based on how they usually price.
The $9.60 hardcover is the though one. It’s “Bargain Priced” which means it’s remainder copies and Amazon may have only a few or they may have dozens at that price, but if they sell out that’s it for HC’s at that price (unless they can get more from Penguin of course). Comparing eBook prices to remainder prices has always been tricky. Should a publisher lower the price of the eBook across the board temporarily while remainder copies are available at Amazon or B&N? I don’t see that happening and there is no such thing as a remainder in the eBook world.
If you look at Amazon’s listed price for the book it is: $24.95. Amazon is giving users a 62% discount which is what gives the $9.69 sell. Publishers sell books to Amazon at a regular discount of 48%. So Amazon is purchasing the book at around $24.95-48% =$12.97. In order for Amazon to be selling the HC at $9.60 and lets say make a profit of 10% they would have had to purchase the book at $24.95-65% = $8.74 , a discount of 65% from the publisher which is highly unlikely.
My guess is that Amazon is talking a loss (something they tend to do quite often, especially in front-list). This is unfortunate as it only hurts publishers and reduces the value of books in the eyes of consumers. Consumers who are now being trained to expect the lowest possible prices without a consideration for the product they are purchasing.
….another person who seems to be unwilling to understand the retail market, and is in turn blaming publishers for retail giant’s discounting practices. Yawn.
I have made similar decisions about book buying over the past year. Unless it’s some sort of special/signed edition, I don’t want physical books any more. I’m less interested in assigning blame, however. As someone pointed out, Amazon controls the discounting of the HC book. If it was full retail, the ebook might look like a good deal (note: or it might not when you consider how many great books there are selling for $3)
The big thing here is that publishers and retailers are focusing on carving out their own position and not on the needs of and the image they portray to readers. As such, both groups, but publishers in particular, are making themselves more vulnerable to losing sales: to libraries, to indie authors, and to the myriad of other forms of entertainment other than books. Amazon at least still gets a cut from some of the last two.
As I said, I’m not interested in blame. But the book market is seriously screwed up right now, and some large companies will no longer be standing when the dust settles. Publishers are the most likely candidates. I tend to think that pricing is not the most fundamental problem they have; the most fundamental problem IMO is that the value they place on their own role in producing a book is higher than readers will be willing to pay going forward, for a variety of reasons. I’m not commenting specifically on how much value I think they add, merely how perceptions of it are changing and will keep changing as ebooks continue to grow. Once you recognize their fundamental miscalculation, their pricing is fairly logical.
The ebook market is relatively new. Let the market sort it out. If high priced ebooks don’t sell, eventually publishers will set a price that will sell. Perhaps the price should even be more than the pbook since it is often more convenient to read an ebook. The cost of production isn’t the only thing that determines price. I have always used the library, used book sales, garage sales, etc. to obtain books, so I am generally unwilling to spend $12-15 for any book, unless I absolutely must read it immediately.
Traditional publishers lost me as a customer last year when they went to the agency model. I keep my wishlist at ereaderiq.com to watch for price drops, but really only purchase indie books now. Half of my wishlist went up in price when Random House implemented the agency model on March 1st, including a 20-year-old backlist title that was already high at $9.99 and then went up to $14.99. I’ll reread my paperback, thanks.
Most indie authors are as good as the big names, price their books very affordably, and are quicker to publish than the traditional publishers who usually take years to get a book out. I’d much rather get 15-20 books for my $30 budget than two or three.
Authors should be fighting tooth and nail to get their ebook rights back to self-publish their backlists. Otherwise, indie authors will pass them by.
It appears that Penguin consistently sets higher prices for e-books, when I decided to read The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand I thought I would pick it up for my Kindle at a reasonable price. Instead, as you’ve already seen, Penguin prices the Kindle Edition at $20.99, the paperback is $9.99, and, of course the local Library is free.
“….another person who seems to be unwilling to understand the retail market, and is in turn blaming publishers for retail giant’s discounting practices. Yawn.”
You are so right the only thing I understand about the marvels of the publishing retail market I learned at Borders. And look what happened there!
Penguin is doing this consistently and this is why I will not continue to buy Jim Butcher’s excellent Dresden series book when the new one comes out this summer. The ebook price is 14.99. A bit higher than the physical book, but way higher than I prefer to pay for fiction. I’ll just borrow it and call it a day.
Before I started reading ebooks a couple of years ago, I almost never bought a book brand new unless it was a gift. I either used the library or bought used from my UBS or online. Neither publishers nor authors were getting paid by me. Then I was gifted with a ereader almost two years ago. My library never had the ebooks I wanted and I couldn’t buy ebooks used, so I had to start spending money, and the authors and publishers were getting paid at last. Ereading was fun – being able to carry lots of books with me wherever I went was almost addictive, and I bought a lot of ebooks. They had me – I was hooked, and spending money with little hesitation.
Enter the agency model and much higher prices, and I buy very few ebooks now (one a month or so). The few I do are in the $3 to $5 dollar range, but none are from agency publishers. I am back to the library and used book stores, and while I’m not having the techie thrill that my ereader brought me, I am smart enough to appreciate that the money I am saving is worth much more in the long run than a cool gadget and mere convenience. I still read those books, but am back to being a non-paying customer for the authors and publishers.
They found a way to get me to give them money, now and for the foreseeable future, and then blew it. I realize that enough people are willing to pay high ebooks prices that the agency model has been deemed a success by the publising industry. I acknowledge that my money is likely not missed, nor is that of others I know that are like me. But I think what publishers are missing in the excitement of making big profits now in ebooks is that they are probably getting money mostly from people who had been giving it to them all along, even before ebooks. People who never set foot in libraries or UBSs. What they are losing is the buildup of new fan bases, losing those people who would have paid a small amount for untried authors or genres and then much more once they became regular followers. I hope agency publishers are investing their current gains wisely, because I don’t think current prices are sustainable. Too many people are willing to not only walk away, but also never even look in the first place.
The big six are in denial, or at least more interested in protecting their print-book sales than promoting their eBook sales. But the situation is worse than you describe. For instance, the book you’re talking about isn’t even available in Canada as Penguin Canada won’t allow it to be sold as a Kindle Book. It’s not that they’re selling Kindle Books and don’t want digital competition. It can only be that they don’t want Kindle Books competing with their paper versions.
The other big problem is what you get for the high price. Buying books from the big six often means you get a book without a cover. While they claim to be doing so much hard work to justify the price, the formatting is often a mess. And for this we get rent a book from them at high prices. Sheez… As you said, they need to get their act together as we’re all finding out that indie authors and small publishers are providing some fine alternatives.
Cheers — Larry
The Six Sisters are dinosaurs who simply do not “get” the new digital model. Their accountants still wear three piece suits to work and use Grecian Formula. They are so embedded in the bricks and mortar method (as are bookstores) of distribution that they are missing out on a lot of profit to be made on reasonably priced ebooks. Soon, they will find that nimbler publishers- both traditional and indie- will be stepping over their dying carcasses.
http://writingandsellingnonfictionbooks.blogspot.com/
In the longer run the prices for print and screen books will reverse. We are still installing the infrastructure for screen books and for print-on-demand. Once accomplished the prices for higher demand titles will increase for e-books and decrease for print copies.
Mr. Meadows,
What a self absorbed whining wanker you are! I can’t believe you!
Imagine reading a book for fun on your own time?! Instead of stealing that time from someone else who’s paying you, not to read mind, but to do something like …oh I don’t know …work?! Diane Duane is a fine author and worth a sale any time and worth the personal time too!
I’m with Chris. I still read everything I want, but the overpriced stuff comes from the library – for free. You can show me math, you can argue all you want, but for me, one of the world’s avid readers who goes through 1-5 books a week, I’m not paying more for an ebook than for a paperback. And there’s absolutely nothing any publisher can do to force me to pay more.
I came in to post about retailer discounts, but I see that other people have already done it.
Not that this is going to stop Teleread from posting breathless screeds about how OMG you GUYS, the PRINT BOOK is CHEAPER!!11!!
I fail to see how the fact that retailers choose to discount print books invalidates my point.
The publishers know from the outset the retailers are going to do it (they’ve been doing it for years, why wouldn’t they keep it up?) so they could price competitively if they wanted to. And the retailers would be able to discount the e-books, too, if the publishers weren’t engaging in consumer-unfriendly price controls.
I agree Chris. Discounting is irrelevant to the core of your article, which is right on the money. The paper distribution and pricing business model of these publishers is so antediluvian and out of date it is unreal. And then they try to transplant the same nonsense into the electronic world.
When we discussed a lot of this 6 months ago many of us felt that this group of Publishers were making an explosion in piracy inevitable if they didn’t change their practices. They are showing no signs of it and no one anywhere will have the slightest sympathy for them when they crank up their whining horn about sales lost to piracy and illegal downloading. There are none so deaf as those who refuse to listen.
“I fail to see how the fact that retailers choose to discount print books invalidates my point.”
“The price for which I can conceivably find the book” is not equal to “the list price”. If you wait long enough you can get the book remaindered for five bucks; does that mean that the price of every book should therefore always be five dollars? That even the nine-ninety-nine trigger-word price for ebooks was too high?
“The publishers know from the outset the retailers are going to do it…so they could price competitively if they wanted to.”
If the retailer wants to take a revenue hit, that’s the retailer’s business; it doesn’t affect the wholesale price. Maybe, if you want ebooks to cost less than print books, you should be complaining about the people who actually set the price of the print books.
Howard says:
“…no one anywhere will have the slightest sympathy for [publishers] when they crank up their whining horn about sales lost to piracy and illegal downloading.”
Well hang on, here, spinach-chin, you told me–quite smarmily–that NOBODY was EVER suggesting that ANYONE would pirate books if they couldn’t get them for the price they wanted. I remember you being quite clear on that point.
DensityDuck – back to the usual insults rather than argument I see. Sad.
I always love it when people think that the words of the argument define it. It’s a useful comment on modern society’s insistence that the style is the substance.
@DD – “you told me–quite smarmily–that NOBODY was EVER suggesting that ANYONE would pirate books if they couldn’t get them for the price they wanted.”
No, as I recall Howard said that no one was suggesting that anyone SHOULD pirate books if they can’t get them for the price they wanted. Lots of people here have been saying that they WOULD. Big difference.
On the bright side, the Kindle e-book is $5.99 now.
On the not so bright side, the sequel has a publication date in 2025, which is usually a sign that no publication date is available…which might suggest that something broke down between Duane and the publisher. I’ll have to ask her about it on the podcast this weekend, but it kind of smells like a work-for-hire book to me. Like Sword of Orion by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, which apparently didn’t do well enough to merit a sequel.