Overview
Bookshop.org is a UK based corporation with the mission to “financially support local, independent bookstores”. The company gives almost all profits from online book sales (+/- 30% of cover price) to independent bookstores and consumers can choose a specific bookstore to give their money on all of their purchases for a year. Otherwise, 10% of the cover price on any order goes into a pool and is shared monthly by participating bookstores. To date, £2,079,557.09 has been generated by Bookshop for independent bookstores.
Image from uk.bookshop.org
How does Bookshop.org compare with Amazon?
Bookshop.org
Buying through an independent bookstore’s affiliate link ensures the publisher and author receive just reward for their book. Bookshop.org’s lack of profit allows the independent bookstore to stay alive.
Bookshop.org continually updates their website featuring sections like “What’s Hot” and “New in 2022 - Books We’re Looking Forward to” - in an effort to stay current.
When an author becomes a Bookshop.org affiliate, they earn 10% of every purchase made from their Bookshop.org sale, on top of what they’re paid by the publisher. There are zero fees for an author to become a Bookshop.org affiliate.
Independent bookstores might have specialities and featured genres, endorsed by Bookshop.org
Bookshop affiliates can drive traffic to their stores simply through their links. They come part of a community.
Amazon
With Amazon, consumers might be buying the book from Amazon directly or from a third-party seller. If the latter is true, there is no guarantee the third-party seller bought the book from the publisher in which case the publisher and author may not be getting paid.
Limited marketing efforts by Amazon combined with there being over 2,000,000 books for sale mean authors don’t receive much publicity.
The author does not always benefit directly from a pay-out from Amazon when Amazon sells their book. Amazon’s books are often bought wholesale from publishers and so authors often depend on publishers for an income.
If Amazon is selling a book for a publisher rather than a self-published writer, the link between author and salesperson can be lost.
Benefits of Bookshop.org for publishers and authors:
- Bookselling partners can withdraw their revenue whenever they like via an easy web interface, provided they have a balance of £20 or more.
- Bookshops participating in the 10% revenue share will receive payments every six months. The revenue share is divided equally among partners.
- Affiliates, bookshops and publishers do not have to provide any fulfilment, shipping, or customer service.
- Whilst advertising opportunities are offered on Bookshop.org, Bookshop.org market all that’s for sale on their website.
- By selling in specific bookstores (affiliates of Bookshop.org), authors and publishers can target certain audiences better than can be done on Amazon or other non-independent book sellers.
