CBA requested the U.S. Dept. of Justice to investigate predatory-pricing practices of Wal-Mart, Amazon.com, and Target in the pre-release of hard-cover books as well as the sales and pricing of e-books. The request seeks to stop monopolization of the publishing industry through predatory pricing that would limit the sale of existing books to only a few retailers. Such practices will damage the entire publishing industry by promoting an unsustainable economic model.
Rick Christian, president of the Colorado Springs-based literary agency Alive Communications, commented for CBA’s letter, saying, “The predatory pricing of Amazon, Target, and Wal-Mart threatens the entire publishing industry…. These retailers can sell hyper-reduced books as ‘loss leaders’ for a time, but it’s an unsustainable model that, without intervention, will shutter hundreds of book stores, force many publishers out of business, gut trade associations, and significantly reduce the number of self-sustaining authors.”
Christian said such practices eventually will limit titles available to consumers and raise prices. “It’s a scenario in which everybody loses in the long run, unless decisive action is taken immediately,” he said. He and his agency have represented very popular authors and titles, such as the “Left Behind” series (65 million unit sales), The Message Bible (10 million sales), and Karen Kingsbury novels (15 million sales).
To read CBA’s letter to the Department of Justice in the USA, please download this file – InvestigationRequestLetter
This article was originally published on the CBA News website on the 23rd of December, 2009. http://www.cbanews.org/article.php?id=1048