No one loves Amazon, but most people use their services if they live where Amazon operates. In the case of a niche publisher such as City of Words there are special reasons. For small-scale publishers sales and distribution are the main problem–the pons asinorum of the book trade – threatening an already fragile business model. This is particularly so in the case of City of Words because the readers of the kind of books we publish form a market that is scattered widely across the globe. Bookshops take a cut from sales that leaves little for the publisher; and in many places bookshops are few and far between. Fulfilling orders for books – whether it’s to supply shops or online customers – is time-consuming. Books are costly to ship, and maintaining stocks is irksome. Sales accounting is a headache. There’s no economy of scale.
And, for better or worse, consumers increasingly choose to buy books online. What Amazon offers a publisher – through KDP, an Amazon subsidiary – is an instant print-on-demand service in any country where they operate. This means that once a formatted PDF of a new book is uploaded by the publisher to the KDP website – complete with graphics and cover art – a customer anywhere can order a copy (they can preview the contents, if they like, using Amazon’s “Look Inside” feature). The book will be printed and bound – in the same country or region where it is ordered – and dispatched a day or two later. Or instantly, if it’s an e-book. Amazon take their cut, which is a variable percentage up to 50 per cent, then remit the remainder to the publisher’s account.
This arrangement means that we do not need to negotiate with printers, maintain stocks of books, fulfil orders, issue invoices, take payments or deal with returns. All this is taken care of by Amazon. We can see the details of sales and income on our KDP dashboard. The books are of good quality. In fact the print stock is better than that used in most trade paperbacks (though the boards – the covers – could do with more rigidity). Rights in the work remain with us and with the author, so we can print and sell copies independently if we want to. But mainly we don’t, because it makes no financial sense. Amazon gives us global reach and an easier life. That’s the reason why – at this point – they are our main point of sale.
cityofwords.net 