Archive for the ‘ebook pricing’ tag
Amazon’s UK eBook Pricing Lower than Competition no comments
The Register is reporting that Amazon’s ebook pricing is lower than that of other sellers in the UK. A sample of 36 books that the Register compared was around 30 percent less than the same ebooks at Waterstones, and almost 25 percent cheaper than WH Smith. The ebooks at Waterstones were actually more expensive than the paper copies.
In the US Amazon offered lower prices on ebooks until the agency model, which lets publishers set the prices of their ebooks, took effect. For titles coming from publishers who have not adopted the agency model (Random House, of course, being the largest of these) prices are still usually lower at the Kindle Store.
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Macmillan CEO John Sargent Writes About the Agency Model no comments
In a rather long article this morning Macmillan CEO John Sargent writes about the agency model and about Macmillan’s ebook pricing strategy. I’ll just quote an excerpt below:
We will price our e-books at a wide variety of prices. In the ink-on-paper world we publish new books in different formats (hardcover, trade paperback, and mass market paperback) at prices that generally range from $35.00 to $5.99. In the digital world we will price each book individually as we do today. Generally e-book editions of hardcover new releases will be priced between $14.99 and $12.99; a few books will be priced higher and lower. This is a tremendous discount from the price of the printed hardcover books, which generally range from $28.00 to $24.00. E-book editions of New York Times hardcover bestsellers will be priced at $12.99 or lower while they are on the printed list. E-book editions of paperback new releases will be generally priced between $9.99 and $6.99.
For physical books, the majority of new release hardcovers are published in cheaper paperback versions over time. We will mirror this price reduction in the digital world. It is too early to estimate the timing of the price reductions for those cases in which we do not issue a paperback edition. If we do issue a paperback, we will drop the digital price to $9.99 or lower at publication date (if not before). The price differential between the book and the e-book will become smaller at the lower price points.
There has been a lot of concern from e-book readers that $9.99 books will no longer be available. Most Macmillan e-books will still be priced below ten dollars. Our e-book sales over the last year clearly indicate that only about a third of our e-book business is in the digital versions of new release hardcovers. Unit sales of older books far exceed our new release hardcover sales, so the $9.99 and lower prices will continue to represent the largest portion of our business.
In short, we will continue to do what we have always done: provide the reader with a vast selection of great books over a wide range of prices.
It remains to be seen whether or not Macmillan will indeed adjust their ebook prices over time to reflect the actual selling prices of pbooks. So far the track record is not stellar.
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