Ptolus at Amazon?

[Numion]

No, this is about the discount, and nothing else.

That is simplifying the case. My problem is with the reason Monte gave for not utilizing a particular distribution channel that can, due to it's effectiveness, offer the product at discounted price.

If the reason had been what StephenBardFox suggested, that Monte doesn't make enough money from Amazon distribution, I would've been okay with the decision. But that is not the reason that was given. Monte wants to artificially keep FLGSs competitive, even though they really aren't. That is just wrong.

 

[resistor]

I wouldn't quite put it this way. I'd say that lots of RPG books are worth their money, but I simply can't afford to buy them all. So I don't. And my buying decision has little to do with their "worth", but everything with my priorities.

That's not contradictory to what he said. He said that the value of a book to you is the maximum price you would ever pay for it. Suppose I really love demons, and would pay $50 for a book about demons. In that case, FC1 is worth $50 to me, and I'm getting a great deal by paying less than I was willing to. Conversely, if I dislike demons, I might never pay more than $5 for a book about them, so FC1 would be very overpriced for me. Obviously you value most RPG books pretty highly, so that it becomes solely an issue of which ones to buy at once, rather than which ones are priced at or below your valuation.

 

[resistor]

I'll add my opinion to the fray.

I don't go to my LGS to hang out. I go there to buy things occasionally, but usually not since they often charge more than list price, and the service isn't particularly great. In short, I feel no need to support them.

Beyond that, I'm not a huge Ptolus fan. I realize that it's innovative and all, but I don't find the setting itself that exciting. I'd probably mine it for ideas, but never play in it directly.

Finally, I often receive Amazon certificates for gifts, such as my birthday which was a few days ago. With $50 in Amazon certificates and a $75 price, I would have been willing to buy it. However, there's it's just not worth it to me to pay $120 for it.

I'm not mad at Monte for this. I'm just not sure it was the wisest course of action, at the least because it has already lost him one sale.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

I think its mroe likely Monte is doing this to drive people to buy it directly from him, so he gets the full $120, rather than what he would get even from a FLGS. BTW, I'm of the opinion that keeping the FLGS's artificially afloat does no one any favors in the long run. They need to find ways to compete on their own, and if they can't, then they'll go the way of the dodo. It would be sad, but the industry would have ways of surviving now that didn't exist ten years ago.

 

[Varianor Abroad]

There are plenty of people that won't buy Ptolus, even at $75. I'm not sure how many people fit in the "will buy it at $75, but not $120" or various price points in between. What people that are focused on the price are complaining about is that the decision was made so that you COULDN'T get that discount.

My point being that Dwarven Forge sells direct and thus prevents me from getting a discount on their stuff unless they offer it. I'm not mad at them about that....

 

[orangefruitbat]

I think it's simply that Monte doesn't want to have to worry about returns from the book business. Taking the risk of having to potentially return $60 x 2,000 units to Amazon (note, numbers pulled out of my ass) 180 days from now sounds like a good way to ruin your business.

That is simplifying the case. My problem is with the reason Monte gave for not utilizing a particular distribution channel that can, due to it's effectiveness, offer the product at discounted price.

If the reason had been what StephenBardFox suggested, that Monte doesn't make enough money from Amazon distribution, I would've been okay with the decision. But that is not the reason that was given. Monte wants to artificially keep FLGSs competitive, even though they really aren't. That is just wrong.

 

[Numion]

I think it's simply that Monte doesn't want to have to worry about returns from the book business. Taking the risk of having to potentially return $60 x 2,000 units to Amazon (note, numbers pulled out of my ass) 180 days from now sounds like a good way to ruin your business.

Then why on earth would he say that the reason was this:

Retailers get burned by Amazon and other similar sellers (but lets be real, it's 99% Amazon) all the time. The higher the price, the more they get burned. (Retailers got burned on World's Largest Dungeon, for example, although eventually even Amazon got burned on that one, but that's a long story.) The thing that happens is that your local retailer buys a book and puts it in his store. Then, a customer comes in, flips through it, decides to buy it, but doesn't buy it from the store. He goes home and orders it through Amazon to get a big discount.

We decided early on that we didn't want that to happen to Ptolus. We want to help out our retailers. So beyond selling direct through the website, we're offering Ptolus only to hobby distributors. Not book trade distributors.

..and not the one you suspect?

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

I think its mroe likely Monte is doing this to drive people to buy it directly from him, so he gets the full $120, rather than what he would get even from a FLGS. BTW, I'm of the opinion that keeping the FLGS's artificially afloat does no one any favors in the long run. They need to find ways to compete on their own, and if they can't, then they'll go the way of the dodo. It would be sad, but the industry would have ways of surviving now that didn't exist ten years ago.

"The industry" only survives because large numbers of authors are willing to work below a living wage, and fandom being what it is, that's unlikely to change.

Still, I'd like to see print books (as opposed to PDFs) from more than just the top five companies - and the smaller companies need dedicated RPG distributors for their print books.

 

[orangefruitbat]

Because it's possible he has more than one concern, and also that Monte is under no obligation to discuss his inner business workings with everyone on some web forum.

1) He has to worry about returns from the book trade that he doesn't have to from the hobby trade. Returns can kill a small publisher.

2) He needs to keep his distrubtors happy. Monte seems concerned that hobby distributors/retailers are nervous about carrying a $120 book (that they can't return) if Amazon can sell it for $75. Now let's say that currently, 70% of Malhavoc's product is sold through traditional FLGS, 20% goes through Amazon and 10% is sold "direct" through the WW store (note that Monte isn't the seller here, WW is). If Monte sells through Amazon (he might get a better wholesale price, though I'm not sure), he takes the risk that hobby distributors won't carry his product, or will carry it in lower quanitites, leaving him with unsold product.

Thus, ironically, he could potentially sell less copies by offering it at a lower price because Amazon will reach fewer gamers than RPG stores. Monte needs to keep his customers (the distributors) happy so that they purchase significant quanitites of his book and get them into FLGS. This problem affects other RPG products as well, but the high price of Ptolus makes it come to the fore here. This sales model is slowly changing, but it's still a reality today.

Did you ever wonder why you can't go to Ford.com or Toyota.com and buy a car online? The auto companies would be happy to sell you one direct. But they would piss off their dealer networks (who typically are independently owned), who control sales. Most states and provinces also have laws against this to protect their dealer networks - because the dealers lobbied to protect themselves. Middlemen do provide a service, and they work hard to not be cut out of the loop. You'll note that the WW store doesn't undercut retailers by offering discounted prices (which their margins would support) simply because they need to keep the distributors and retailers happy.

Then why on earth would he say that the reason was this:



..and not the one you suspect?

 

[Vocenoctum]

I think it's simply that Monte doesn't want to have to worry about returns from the book business. Taking the risk of having to potentially return $60 x 2,000 units to Amazon (note, numbers pulled out of my ass) 180 days from now sounds like a good way to ruin your business.

We'll assume that White Wolf (& Associates) have a standard book deal with Book Trade (& Amazon). The terms are <insert terms>. Ptolus is not being offered to them under those terms, or at all. It's certainly possible for them to say "We'll sell you Ptolus at X discount and under these return conditions." to make the discount unlikely. It may have been more work than they wanted to bother with of course, no fault there.

But, really, I'm still pretty sure Amazon WILL have Ptolus. They buy plenty of books from the game channels, and simply don't discount them as much. I'm also sure plenty of folks will buy from Amazon, discount or no.

Personally, I believe the decision has more to do with White Wolf's online sales of the book and the preorders. They make more that way, and they've already told customers that they'd be getting the best deal that way. (And, Cook fans will still be getting more material than just the book, so they are, but at the same time Cook fans will already have lots of that material and it'll be a little redundant.)

The LGS dislike Amazon taking business away from them, but it's not all about the discount. LGS's are run quite poorly quite often.