The Least They Could Do: Amazon Charges 1 Cent To Meet French Free Shipping Ban 309
Last year, we mentioned that the French government was unhappy with Amazon for offering better prices than the French competition, and strongly limited the amount by which retailers can discount books. Last month, the French parliament also passed a law banning free delivery of books. Ars Technica reports that Amazon has responded with a one-penny shipping rate on the orders that would previously have shipped free. Says the article:
This is by no means the first time France has tried to put a damper on major US tech companies dabbling in books or other reading materials. In 2011, the country updated an old law related to printed books that then allowed publishers to impose set e-book pricing on Apple and others. And in 2012, there was the very public dispute between French lawmakers and Google over the country's desire to see French media outlets paid for having their content pop up in search results. At least for now with this most recent situation, an online giant has found a relatively quick and easy way to regain the upperhand.
Re: Not France vs US (Score:5, Informative)
It is not a technology issue. The law that stated a maximum of 5% discount for books goes back to 1981. Decades before Amazon even existed. It was put in place to assure that local bookshops could compete on an equal term to big competitors (like supermarkets selling books etc...). Right now the French government has only clarified that that 5% maximum discount is also to include also the shipping charges. So you can't do 5% discount (allowed by law) on the book + x% discount (shipping).
Now as to the price of books, maybe you don't know but french books cost on average less than american ones. And considering the US is a much larger market, a free market WHAT does that really tell you ? The French have a vibrant cultural market. Especially when it comes to books. They love books, they love reading, and they buy a lot of books. Much more on average than americans. If this law were so bad you would see people stopping buying books but that's not what happens. Ensuring that local bookshops survive is a good thing to everyone.
Imagine a future were only Amazon or Apple can distribute/sell books. It would be a nightmare. Even now when thy don't have much of the market they're brazen in their attemps to censor/blocks books that aren't morally suited to the corporation. You want to publish a young adult books that talks about teen sex, tough luck. Apple doesn't like it so you don't get to publish it. No thanks. Having retail stores that stock and get access to all the back catalog is a good thing for everyone.
Re: Not France vs US (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, the law says no such thing. Before this new law, booksellers in France could sell a book with at most a 5% discount relative to the mandatory price set by the publisher. The idea was to prevent supermarkets and larger booksellers from competing on price and driving smaller shops out of business. In the 1980s, it made some sense, as people were afraid that supermarkets would only stock bestsellers and that smaller shops were necessary to ensure the availability of more specialized, less popular books. Back then, the only people shipping books were mail-order book clubs, which re-published bestsellers after a year or two and did not have much market share.
With the advent of the internet, booksellers started complaining that Amazon and FNAC were too successful. Since they could offer both the 5% discount and free shipping, customers paid as little as it was legally possible and enjoyed the extra convenience of not having to visit several bookshops to find the rare book that they'd been looking for. This is definitely a good thing for consumers and Amazon takes care of the long tail much more effectively and efficiently than smaller booksellers. Plus everyone was treated equally: smaller shops could also offer free shipping if they wanted to: they just could not afford it due to the lower volumes involved. Amazon can negotiate very good shipping rates and buy books much cheaper. Publishers sell them their books with a 50% discount, versus 30-40% for smaller bookstores.
The law now says that you can still offer a 5% discount BUT, if you ship the book to the customer, this 5% discount must be deducted from the shipping fees, which cannot amount to zero. Thus, if Amazon sells a €10 book, they probably charge a €0.51 shipping fee, which ends up being €0.01 after the 5% discount. They're still at a disadvantage since a physical store can sell the same book for €9.5. Which means that the law now clearly favors physical stores, much more than it did small bookstores vs supermarkets before.
It is not about you. (Score:2, Informative)
The real problem here is not Amazon or books or even Google, it's the French mindset that things should never change,
Fetishing bookshops doesn't have any emotional appeal to me - they're just buildings stacked with a small and limited selection of reading materials, which inefficiently deploy land and people. Given the rise of the e-book even large chain bookshops will likely disappear over the coming decades, and who will cry for them?
The geek as cultural imperialist.
What has no value for me has no value for you.
The French have all kinds of worthwhile ideas on larger matters. This occurred to me recently when I was strolling through my museum-like neighborhood in central Paris, and realized there were --- I kid you not --- seven bookstores within a 10-minute walk of my apartment. Granted, I live in a bookish area. But still: Do the French know something about the book business that we Americans don't?
For a few bucks off and the pleasure of shopping from bed, have we handed over a precious natural resource --- our nation's books --- to an ambitious billionaire with an engineering degree?
France, meanwhile, has just unanimously passed a so-called anti-Amazon law, which says online sellers can't offer free shipping on discounted books. The new measure is part of France's effort to promote "biblio-diversity" and help independent bookstores compete. Here, there's no big bookseller with the power to suddenly turn off the spigot. People in the industry estimate that Amazon has a 10 or 12 percent share of new book sales in France. Amazon reportedly handles 70 percent of the country's online book sales, but just 18 percent of books are sold online.
The French secret is deeply un-American: fixed book prices.
Fixing book prices may sound shocking to Americans, but it's common around the world, for the same reason. In Germany, retailers aren't allowed to discount most books at all. Six of the world's 10 biggest book-selling countries --- Germany, Japan, France, Italy, Spain and South Korea --- have versions of fixed book prices.
What underlies France's book laws isn't just an economic position --- it's also a worldview. Quite simply, the French treat books as special. Some 70 percent of French people said they read at least one book last year; the average among French readers was 15 books. Readers say they trust books far more than any other medium, including newspapers and TV. The French government classifies books as an "essential good," along with electricity, bread and water. A French friend of mine runs a charity, Libraries Without Borders, which brings books to survivors of natural disasters.
The French aren't being pretentious or fetishizing bookstores. They're giving voice to something we know in America, too. "When your computer dies, you throw it away," says Mr. Montagne of the publishers' association. "But you'll remember a book 20 years later. You've deeply entered into a story that's not your own. It's forged who you are. You'll only see later how much it has affected you. You don't keep all books, but it's not a market like others. The contents of a bookcase can define who you are."
The French Do Buy Books. Real Books. [nytimes.com]