Independent booksellers, cultural product chains and newsagents in France have released a joint statement condemning the announcement by Amazon France of a 5% discount in the retail price of new books delivered to more than 3,000 collection points across France.
In the joint statement, the industry said they are “extremely worried” by Amazon’s decision to offer the discount on books delivered to “eligible collection points,” notably lockers.
This initiative, following the start of free deliveries to 2,500 points last November, “is a commercial manoeuvre that violates the single book law and distorts competition among book retailers,” it said.
The independent book mediator has said on two occasions that lockers outside stores that sell books are not covered by the law that permits free deliveries to stores that do sell books, it added. Saying the initiative appears to be “dumping”, the signatories said they have asked the mediator to organise a conciliation procedure prior to taking Amazon to court.
The signatories are the French Booksellers Association (Syndicat de la Librairie Française, SLF,) which represents 3,200 indies, the French Association of Distributors of Cultural and Leisure Goods (Syndicat des Distributeurs de Loisirs Culturels, SDLC), which represents 117 Cultura shops and 1,200 Maison de la Presse newsagents, and France’s largest cultural product chain FNAC, which has more than 230 outlets in France.
Amazon has disputed the mediator’s opinion about lockers. Announcing the 5% discount on 16th October, the group said the discount would apply to all the 3,000-plus collection points. More than 70% are in rural areas or small towns, and the majority are customer reception counters in shops selling books, it said.
The Bookseller asked Amazon whether books delivered to lockers inside shopping malls, but not within the premises of shops selling books, were dispatched free of costs and benefited from the 5% discount, but this is still unknown.
Amazon instead referred to its 16th October statement.