We are seeing lots of complaints online from authors (published by a variety of publishers – including Amazon!) who are claiming Amazon has recently raised the price of their books by $8, $10, or even more. Yes, that’s PER BOOK.
After doing some research, this is what we found:
Amazon is going through some MAJOR changes right now.
1. They are closing warehouses that they built and overstocked during the pandemic.
2. Because of the economy, their sales are way down.
“The company reported a second quarterly loss of $2bn compared with a $7.8bn profit for the same period in 2021. Amazon reported a $3.8bn loss in the previous quarter.” – The Guardian
3. Their stock (like others) is plummeting. As of this writing, it’s dropped $50 per share in the past year (31%).
4. They are obviously tightening their belts in some areas. Previously, if I placed two different orders on the same day, the items would be shipped separately. Now, Amazon combines the orders into one box when possible.
5. They are pricing products very low in the warehouses they are closing. We are seeing prices of some books in the $3 to $4 dollar range – books that Amazon purchased brand new. Amazon is losing a significant amount of money on those sales but they’re losing even more by having warehouses they don’t need.
6. For some reason we can’t understand, they are pricing other print books sky high. There are numerous reports among publishers and authors all over that Amazon has raised the list prices of their paperback books by $8 or $10…or even more! This is even happening to many authors who had Amazon KDP publish their books!
7. Some surmise it’s a database error that Amazon may or may not fix in the future. Some believe that Amazon is trying to encourage people to use third party sellers on its site as, with Amazon’s latest price increases, many third party sellers are selling books for less (though still, typically, more than the list price the author/publisher originally chose). Others believe Amazon is trying to get more people to buy ebooks so that less warehousing will be needed in the future. Of course, they tried that before and people still favored print books over ebooks by a very high margin.
What everyone is sure of is that Amazon won’t be giving any firm answers to anyone anytime soon.
What can you, as an author, do? If you see that Amazon has jacked up the price of your book, ask your publisher to contact Ingram, the distributor. Ingram sends an automated feed to Amazon and other retailers. If Amazon’s prices are deviating from that feed, Ingram can “open a ticket” with Amazon to ask a real human to fix the problem. Amazon may or may not comply. And, it’s their business. They can legally price a product at whatever they want.
And, know that, if Amazon does sell the book at the higher price, you do NOT get the excess profit. Neither does your publisher. Amazon keeps it all. You will only get the agreed-upon percentage of the list price that your publisher offered you in your contract.
In the meantime, we are strongly encouraging all of our authors to refer their readers to their book’s pages on BookLocker.com and BarnesandNoble.com. You might consider asking your readers to purchase directly from your publisher (if they sell direct) and from BarnesandNoble.com, too. BarnesandNoble does not play the same nasty games that Amazon does.
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- Did Amazon “Give” Your Buy Button to a 3rd Party Seller and is Your List Price Way Too High? WE HAVE A TIP FOR YOU!
- OUCH! Some POD Publishers Raising Book Prices TOO HIGH!
- The Price Of My POD Book Is Way Too High
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