Harry Potter and the Independent Bookstore

For those of you who don't know, I've taken a part-time job at a book-store/coffee-shop. It's a great way to continue my knowledge of all things books while having enough time for family and writing.

I'm lucky enough to be heavily involved on the book side of things. In fact, it's the reason I was hired. I research the book orders, add my recommendations, sets up the shelves, and look after the little darlings when they arrive.

I've learned new things playing the role of bookseller, and as time goes by, I'll share more with our readers about what I'm learning. This week, I wanted to talk about an interesting phenomenon happening right now.

First though, set aside any prejudice about Harry Potter and just look at the business side of this. This could have easily been a Left Behind book in this scenario.

The final Harry Potter book is scheduled for a July 21, 2007 release. A sought-after, best-selling book is considered a boon to the market. Bookstores with sagging sales are given a chance to catch up. The Harry Potter books usually have great publicity. Reading becomes in vogue. People who haven't visited a bookstore online or in person since the last Potter book are suddenly thrust back into this world.

The bookstore I work at is an independent, and the town's only bookstore. Its had its doors open for two weeks, and the upcoming Harry Potter release has been seen with a sigh of relief. People are just discovering the store and every few days we send out a new order—reinvesting all that has been made on books into expanding our book selection.

The discussion has been started towards taking pre-purchases on Harry Potter in order to use the funds to literally stock the shelves—so any author reading this, our ability to stock your book depends upon this too.

Imagine the look on my face when I read this week in PW's daily that Harry Potter was being sold on Amazon at a 49% discount, with guaranteed delivery on its release date—or it's free.

49% is a better discount than our store is capable of purchasing the novel at. We'd be paying the customers to read Harry Potter if we tried to compete. (Barnes and Noble has a similar price, though tad bit less extravagant. )

Now we all know better than to sound complain-ly. Heaven forbid. Somebody, somewhere might hear my whiney tone and blacklist me or worse—whatever that may be. But seriously, who made this crippling decision?

Has Amazon decided just to take a small margin of profit in order to have the bulk of the orders? And if so, somebody, somewhere made the decision to offer these books to Amazon at a price where they in turn could offer Harry Potter to their customers cheaper than independent bookstores can purchase them for. (And to make sure we're all on the same page, this discount would be because Amazon ordered such a HUGE number of H.P. books.)

Or, is Amazon making this novel a loss leader (a marketing strategy where a business takes a loss in order to draw in more customers)? So, people can purchase Harry Potter cheap on Amazon, but in order to take advantage of the free shipping, they must order one more book—thus the customer orders one more book and Amazon still makes a profit.

I don't know which it is, but I do know it's crippling us. I won't say that's not fair, but good grief! Our boon is limited to those who read Harry Potter but aren't Internet savvy.

Our store would be doing better to purchase the novel through Amazon rather than our distributor. Only Amazon waited until after the deadline when bookstores had to place their order to guarantee the novel on the release date. If Amazon is in the position of offering a loss leader, it'd be interesting to see what would happen if independent bookstores ganged together only ordered Harry Potter through Amazon (and returned the stock they orignally purchased), thus keeping the loss with Amazon.

Too bad there's not discount restriction on the novel. I know, I know. Business is business. We've all seen You've Got Mail. But Apple does it. They limit the discount retailers can offer their products at. Some manufactures don't allow online retailers to show the price—because it's so low—before you place it in your cart. At least that's something. Try Googling "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Amazon," and you'll see the news of this discount has spread everywhere.

So, I've spelled what I'm seeing from the trenches. I confess, I'm only two weeks into this side of things. And grudgingly I do have to admit I admire Amazon's marketing skills. Those who have been involved in distribution and bookseller longer, please feel free to comment and fill in the gaps.

Anyone else have anything to add?