Anti-trust or something.

[Guest guest]

> Seems like the on-line discounters should be taking their price off of

> that 40% discount. They don't?

 

They do. But, since the highly-visible on-line prices become a defacto

standard,

publishers raise the list price to protect the sellers who actually buy and

stock

the books. Publishers who work with the trade, and not all do, know the

traditional re-sellers need the margin to afford holding stock. A good

bookseller, at any level of the trade, will own something like five times the

number of titles needed to make a period's sales.

 

> You know, TCM book publishers is not an

> especially long list of people. What if you guys got together and chose

> not to discount your books to on-line distributors for less than you sell

> to physical booksellers? Is that anti-trust or something?

 

Once you publish a price list, it must apply to all. When the chain discounters

of the 80's arm-twisted the major publishers into secret, higher discounts than

afforded the independents, Cody's - an excellent independent bookstore in

Berkeley - investigated and sued. The court upheld the rule that

quantity-price

listings must be fairly maintained. It is not anti-trust, but it is illegal.

 

Bob

 

 

bob Paradigm Publications

www.paradigm-pubs.com 44 Linden Street

Robert L. Felt Brookline MA 02445

617-738-4664

 

You are old when your youth has been reduce to the themes of car commericals.