Selling Books through Independent Bookstores vs. Selling through Major Online Sellers
Sunday, November 20, 2011 
Guest Post by Irene Watson
I received an email from an angry independent bookstore owner saying:
I have unscubscibed as I resent your sending buyers to Amazon instead of independent book sellers and then have the nerve to send it to us to support. I had assumed you were independent as well. What a scam.
Ouch. My response was:
Your email was sent to me for attention and I'd like to respond. First of all, I appreciate your concern and know how frustrating it is to compete against sellers like Amazon.com or BarnesAndNoble.com. I'm very much for independent book sellers, buying local, as well as keeping jobs in our own country.
In the past I've attempted to work with independent books sellers but have experienced many problems in doing so. Let me explain some of the issues:
1. When I first started offering reviews we were listing some of the books to be purchased through an independent book seller that had the books in stock. It worked just fine until one day they decided to close down the site because sales weren't paying for their expenses. Consequently, all the hundreds of pages on our site had broken links and it cost me a bundle of money to pay someone to re-link the pages to a reliable seller. Each one had to be done individually. We spent more money correcting the links than our referral commission was since we started selling through them. Going through this once I'm not about to fork out money again. It is doubtful that a company like Amazon.com or BarnesAndNoble.com will shut down in any near future.
2. You can ask any self-published author and most will give you a long rendition of how difficult it is to place a book in independent bookstores. This same goes for books published by a small press. I've experienced this as an author myself, even with local independent book stores. They tend to carry well-known authors' books and only sometimes will carry local authors' books. In most cases they will only order through specific distributors and require a return policy. Some will accept books on consignment from local authors.
3. Independent bookstores don't carry every book on the market, especially books by self-published authors. Cathy Langer, lead buyer for the Tattered Cover bookstores in Denver, said she had been inundated by requests from self-published authors to sell their books. “People think that just because they’ve written something, there’s a market for it. It’s not true.” Even as large as Tattered Cover is, they don't carry every book on the market but someone like Amazon.com or BarnesAndNoble.com does.
4. Although independent bookstores offer to order books, it often takes 2 weeks, or longer, to receive the book. If we send potential buyers to your store you would have to order the book, have it sent to you, and then re-ship it to the buyer. Total time could take up to 3 weeks, maybe more. Many readers are impulse buyers and when ordering online expect the book to be delivered within a few days.
5. Librarians, the major target of the First Chapter Plus eCatalog, will not buy books from an independent bookstore at full price. They will order through a distributor or through an Amazon reseller who often sell the book for less than the distributor. It is doubtful that you can complete with these resellers.
I looked on your website. Your website doesn't provide us a quick way to download the book information - there is no automatic way of doing so. Remember, we make very little referral fee and everything has to be done automatically and easily. I, no different than you, have overhead and have to make enough money to pay for staff to do the work; manual referral is out of the question.
I attempted to download your catalog and wasn't successful in doing so. I have a high-powered computer with high-speed internet. The first time the download timed out, and the second time it froze my computer. I can't send potential readers/customers where downloading a catalog is unsuccessful. As well, the last catalog on your list is for "2011 Summer." Your winter catalog has not been uploaded yet and should have been by now.
You don't have an affiliate program on your site for us. As I said, we also have overhead and we need to make money to pay for it. Without an affiliate program we don't get paid. If we don't get paid, we can't pay our staff; if we don't have staff, we can't run a site.
From what I can see on your site it is not updated regularly. The last posting for the Book of the Month Club was February 2011. We are now in November 2011. As I looked around, other areas of the website have not been updated.
I can understand this independent bookstore owner's frustration but on the other hand she isn't providing a service either. It's much easier for her to get angry at me and call me scam rather than take her own responsibility in meeting the needs of the consumer. And, she's not the only one. I've checked many online independent book stores' websites that have contacted us to send potential buyers to them and they fall into the same category as above. Not only that, many are shutting down. I do feel for them because it's not easy to compete against large corporations when you're a little fish in the huge pond of barracudas. However, the bottom line for the author or publisher to consider is who will provide the best service but more so who will have the books available for impulse buyers.
By the way, the person that sent me the angry email didn't respond to my email and she didn't upgrade her website either.
What has been your experience with independent bookstores, as a seller or a buyer? Would you solely list your book with an independent online bookstore that doesn't have an updated site?
Reader Comments (8)
My five experiences with local booksellers is as follows:
1: The one closest to my home closed as my first independent book was about to be published in the Christmas season of 2007. Plans for an author event were not fulfilled.
2. Presenting that book to one bookstore, I got a non-response after leaving the book for consideration.
3. One bookstore has ten copies, unpaid for, which to my knowledge may or may not have sold. An offer to do an author event was not taken.
4. Presenting that book to another bookstore, I was told I may leave 4 copies for temporary seasonal consignment, and later received a note to come pick up any unsold copies before they were donated to charity. I did receive a check for two sold books.
5. My second independent book was accepted by a toy store for shelf sale, and both my second and latest books are regularly sold in a local hardware store. My latest will also be sold in a local bake shop during the Christmas season.
When experienced authors say that bookstores are not necessarily the best place to sell books, perhaps there's something to be considered by both the authors and the booksellers. My best success with author events so far has been the local library and school classroom visits. May not sell a ton of books, but it does get the word out.
My books were listed with one on-line catalogue, which went dead about a year ago. I sold one book through them, for which the manager did pay me very promptly.
I've had bad experiences with local independent bookstores, also, to the point where I am no longer willing to put books on consignment with them. One - in which they sold regularly and well, experienced severe financial difficulties, and eventually had to reorganize and relocate - paid me for a large number of sales with a check that bounced, although they did make it good. Another time, I had to bug them for months by phone and email, before recieving a payment. The other local independent bookstore - which had once been very supportive of local authors - seems to be changing focus to exclusively children's books. It took eight months to get payment for a small number of copies on consignment.
I have resolved from now on to sell directly - taking a table at craft shows and fairs, and doing speaking events. My books are distributed by Ingram, have 55% discount with returnability, so if the big box stores want to stock them, there's no excuse not to. The local Hastings chain does so, and so did Borders - and so do a couple of local historical museums. I am no longer willing to subsidize the independent bookstores with my inventory, and wait around for months to be reimbursed. Like Mr. Masse, I am having better luck with non-traditional retail venues to sell my books.
Hooray for you ! What a great defense. My first thought on reading your enraged independent book business comment was, "She obviously does not know Irene or she would have never dumped on her like that. Irene, above all, is fair minded and has impeccable integrity." Looks like your challenger is missing some of that. Keep up the good work, Margie
For my first book, I sent letters to about a dozen independent booksellers in Michigan. I included a flier describing the book with a picture of the front cover and the table of contents. I offered to send them a free copy of the book, no strings attached. Not one seller responded. Needless to say I did not even attempt to contact them regarding my second book.
Dave
Thanks for the information, Irene. When I became an independent author a year ago, I decided to stick with the major online booksellers. They make it easy -- especially through Smashwords and Amazon's CreateSpace and KDP -- for unknown writers to sell their books. I'm sure they know many independent authors will fail, but they can make a ton of money off those who are wildly, or even mildly, successful. Thanks for all your insights into our business, Irene.
My experience with independent bookstores overall has been a good one, going back to my first release nearly ten years ago. Several local indies routinely have me in for signings and festivals, even though I now only publish e-books.
I've found it easier to get my print books in indie stores rather than B & N and Borders. I didn't self-publish but my first prublisher was print on demand and this caused a problem for the large chain stores, in spite of a return policy. I've been able to get my print books in stores in Florida, even though I don't reside there, because they take place there and the owners I've worked with love to have Florida-themed books on their shelves.
Interesting post, Irene.
I recently self published a book. I didn't even consider trying to sell it in a book store let alone an independent book store. I can see why an Indie store would only sell mainstrem books and maybe some local author's books to survive. But in my case, I'm foucusing on e-books and audios. POD audios can be expensive to porduce so downloading is cheaper. It makes more sense for me to use the internet route. Book stores are going the way of the doe doe now anyway. The younger generation is downloading everything these days so indie book stores might have another 10 years if they're lucky. I don't really agree with it or think it's for the best, but for the generation who grew up with constant technology, a download is the new impulse sale.
Great post, Irene. Self-publishing a book is much better option ............ well that's what I think .
Thanks for sharing and yeah Happy Christmas !!!