what would happen if publishers didn’t set the prices? what would happen if, instead of participating (or not) in the discount wars, bookstores could set their own book prices? SERIOUSLY, WHAT WOULD HAPPEN?
in one of the Winter Institute small group sessions, we got talking about fixed pricing vs the wholesale model, and i can’t stop wondering: what would happen to books if they didn’t have a price printed on the cover?
Published 26 February 2013 Uncategorized 1 CommentTags: i have them, omg books, publishing, questions
When a sales tax (GST) was first introduced in Australia in 2001 prices printed in books were removed to comply with the change over and then never came back. RRP was gone but…
In Australia an author’s royalty is based on the RRP (recommended retail price) not the wholesale price so for invoicing purposes bookshops were still provided books with an SRP (suggested retail price) less the standard discount. Most bookshops (indies) sold at SRP like they did at RRP. The difference though was that the consumer then blamed bookshops for book prices not publishers because there was not public RRP anymore!