Bookjackers

[emmbook]

Probably not news to most here, but a good summary of how Bookjackers operate:

http://www.zubalbooks.com/article-bookjacking.jsp

[bookthink]

I hear you, Keith, but I'll wait to reply after emm weighs in. She started this mess.

[bugler1998]

Am I missing something here?

The only problem I have with dropshippers is when their sell listings say that they have a particular book in their physical possession, when they do not.

As i am sitting here watching the baseball game, I have 1000 plus books listed that are not in my physical possession. Now all I have to do is drive to the office, hope the highways are open, hope the rlectric is on in my office building, and then hope the key works in my storage closet.
Now I have physically seen my books, so there is a difference.
Who here has not bought a book for $1 at a garage sale and sold it for $100? I hooe you all have, or you may want to reconsider your business model.
I got my bookselling start on Half and sold my fair share of books to Milde. Once i figured out he was a dropshipper and figured out how they work, i reconsidered how I figured my prices.
My point is i have no problem with dropshippers as long as they do not say they have abook in their possession when they do not.

[chagrinbooks]

I can't speak for each one of them, but I'm confident that most consumers presume a book is in a bookseller's possession. If we're going to get sematical about the definition of possession, then I rest my case. 

[taylor_memorial]

I would think there is something different from securily storing a book you've listed while in your hands and selling a book that you've never seen based on a generic description you've offered to the public based on a listing posted by someone else.

I could be wrong, though. I'm told I'm pretty stupid.

On the other hand what this business model does is invert the "collegial discount" model used by the trade for many years. Allow me to illustrate.

Craig (Bookthink) once bought a book in absolutely abysmal condition from me. But it was described as such. I've no idea why he'd spend $10 for a book that bad but he likes to futz around with syringes full of glue and other toys and somehow manages to make it work. Too much time on his hands, I guess, but it's none of my business so long as he didn't complain and after 5 years (or more) he hasn't.

I told the story a while back, in a different context and Joe (Fine.books) pointed out that we all have a different set of clientele and he could well have gotten $100 for that book even without any messing about in his repair shop.

Now: had he bothered to go to Biblio and buy the book, he'd have gotten a collegial discount of a few pennies. 

But the point here is that a good portion of any bookseller's custom used to be sales between booksellers to fulfill clients known or expected needs.

I'm quite sure Zubal remembers looking through mimeographed want lists and sending post cards for books he had a buyer for, or a client who had an abiding interest in the subject of _________________. 

Drop shipping turns that model upside down and offers the mimeographed list to another audience with a markup.

It's just part of the business. The more unseemly parts of it--like not putting packing lists with prices in with the book--can be ignored.

The internet has changed the trade, and the trade has evolved with it.

I can't count the times I've sold a title where I' competeing with anybook or wonderbooks or Thriftbooks or other dropshippers before their book sells and they have to take down their listing.

Meanwhile they offer my book to audiences I don't. That's what New World Archive does. And that's what the old mimeograph list and post card model did before the internet. 

If Zubal isn't willing to spend the money (like me) to list on a site and the sale goes to a consumer on that site where I don't list for a higher price than I'm asking I still get my price. 

If it's a $25 book and the consumer is not savvy enough to look for it elsewhere and spends $90 for it, how is that different from using a book search service and paying for it?

It's not. 

Both Zubal and I could raise our price to $90 to match the drop-shippers and now it's a $90 book.

Which, if it is as hard to find as Zubal suggests, it probably should be. Can't even buy a decent pair of shoes for $90 these days.

[bookthink]

But the point here is that a good portion of any bookseller's custom used to be sales between booksellers to fulfill clients known or expected needs.

This is the key point, I think. Dropshipping is in essence the same model, with dropshippers depending on the accuracy of other bookseller's descriptions, as in ye olde days. And - they pay the price of admission like anybody else. I agree that it distorts the appearance of the marketplace some in that more copies appear to be floating around than is actually the case, and that's somewhat unfortunate, but a far greater distortion, IMO, is the growing presence of e-books and POD's. On a venue like Abebooks, for example, it's not unusual to perform a "lowest price" search for a title and encounter several pages of these before a real book is encountered. Dropshippers would be more likely to appear, harmlessly, on later pages. Even so, given the bare bones descriptions these sellers typically use, it gives the rest of us a chance to stand out from the crowd.

I don't recall that book, BTW.

[taylor_memorial]

No doubt you got what you expected for whatever reason--the point was to illustrate the model and how it has morphed with the internet.

Who is "wrong" in the original model? Zubal for not pricing his $25 book where the "market" says it is? Or the 5 drop shippers who determine a "market" price of 3.46x the price Zubal lists it for on his web site?

Frankly I think that any bookseller who has his own site is foolish if they don't also use the rest of the sites to promote business there, and equally foolish not to offer a discount for purchase on your own site where the cost of doing business, ie commission, is much less. 

I keep putting off opening my own site and then something happens that changes my plans so I put it off again ... but that's what I'd do. That $25 book would be $25 on my site and $30 on Amazon, half, Barnes & Noble and $27.50 on Biblio based on these sites' commission structure. 

I just had a sale to Athens, OH. Is NBC back in business?

[albeesmom]

Sorry, but MYGRANDMASGOODIES is fraudulent.
There are just TOO MANY INSTANCES where people (including myself)
have ordered expensive books which the seller claims to have sent
but which never arrive. AMAZON refunded my money ONE DAY after
my complaint--so they know these shysters are not on the up and up.
Just don't know why they haven't been BANNED from the site after so
much CHICANERY.