It’s the time of year when gift-giving is on everyone’s mind! Whether you’re buying for a book-loving family member or friend, or just trying to figure out something to give to your coworker who you saw reading during their lunch break once, books are probably on your shopping list. Now that we have online shopping, it’s most people’s first instinct to add the book of their choice to their upcoming Amazon order. Before you click “buy,” consider a few reasons why shopping at your local independent bookstore can make a big difference.
Before we get into it, I do want to make a big caveat! I know that for plenty of people, buying books online is the only feasible option, whether because of money or because there are no bookstores in their area or there is a bookstore but they can’t get to it or a whole host of other reasons. This post isn’t for them. I’m writing this because, in my experience, a lot of people have the capability of buying locally, but just don’t know how important making that decision can be. I’m not trying to guilt you into spending money you don’t have or otherwise shame you about circumstances you can’t control; I’m trying to round up a lot of good points I’ve seen in disparate posts and tweets into one place so that book buyers can make more informed decisions.
Actual people will see the book
This is particularly important for pre-orders. If you pre-order a book from a local store, a real live person will see the order. They might be in charge of purchasing for the store and decide to order several copies because someone pre-ordered it. If several people pre-order it, they might make a display based on it. Even if they’re not the person who takes care of purchasing, they might read it and choose it as a staff pick. This is one instance where even just one or two people buying and/or pre-ordering from an indie bookstore can make a difference—it doesn’t take much to get the attention of purchasers in the bookstore.
It helps the author get paid more
The way authors make money is by getting paid a percentage of the book’s sale price (called royalties). Notice it’s the book’s sale price, not how much the book is listed for on the cover. This means that although it might be cheaper online, when you pay a few dollars more in the bookstore, the author is able to make more money, support themselves, and it’s more likely they’ll be able to sell another book, since the publisher also makes more money. From one sale it’s not much money, but if a large percentage of people who buy books online started buying in-store, it would make a difference. This is especially important when you consider that the cost of nearly every other form of entertainment has gone up with inflation (movies, games, restaurants) but books still cost similar to what the did ten to twenty years ago. There are a lot of complicated reasons for this that I’m not going to get into because I’m not an economist, but the salient point is that if you want to support authors and books, paying a few more dollars to buy it in-store can actually make a big difference.
The New York Times bestseller list (probably) places a higher value on book sales at independent stores
There are lots of bestseller lists around the country, but probably the most prestigious and certainly the most well-known is the list the New York Times produces. If you’re not involved in the book world at all, it’s natural to assume that this list is a straightforward compilation of the number of books sold in the country that week. That’s what the name suggests, right? But actually, the NYT list is more curated than that. For one thing, it’s just not possible to know every single sale of a book every week. Publishers will eventually know that information (it’s how they know how much to pay the author, since they get that percentage of the sales) but they usually gather it six months at a time, not weekly.
So all these bestseller lists have to come up with their own way of creating a weekly ranking. The NYT is notoriously secret about their process, but what we do know is that they get their sales numbers from a specific group of chain bookstores, independent book retailers, online sellers, supermarkets, universities, department stores, and newsstands. What most authors and publishers suspect is that independent bookstores weigh more heavily in this process, especially over online retailers or big box stores. To be clear, the NYT has never confirmed this, but people have gamed the list by purchasing huge amounts of their own books from certain bookstores believed to be counted by the List, suggesting that these independent booksellers were a key part of the NYT bestseller. Either way, it certainly doesn’t hurt the book’s chance of making the list if it’s purchased at an indie store, so why risk it?
Bookstores offer more than just books
Sure, when you think of your local bookstore, you think of books. It’s the main thing they sell. But it’s not by any means the only thing they offer. Just a glance at the events calendar of my local bookstore reveals the wide variety of things they have going on: events to hear authors speak, book clubs, literature festivals for children, writing groups. Bookstores also allow you to interact with real people who love books and can recommend books to you or help you expand your taste, and many buy used books so you can keep buying more new ones. Bookstores offer so much to their surrounding communities (much of it free!) but they, of course, can only do that if they’re open! So support your bookstore and everything it does by buying books from it.
Good for the local economy
Okay, I know this is the reason everyone throws out to buy local, but it’s true! Almost none of the money spent through online retailers will go back to your local community—it’s pretty much just whatever the delivery drivers and warehouse workers get paid, as they’re the main local needs online sellers have. Big box stores also have headquarters likely not located in your city, so a chunk of those sales also go elsewhere. With locally owned stores, your money stays in the community, and they also pay property taxes and collect sales tax, while online retailers and other large stores often get tax breaks so big they end up costing the government more than it’s worth.
But what if…
I don’t know where a bookstore is?
Check out IndieBound! You can put in your zip code and a radius of miles, and it’ll tell you all the independent bookstores in your area. If you have a library nearby, they can probably also give you some recommendations.
There’s not one near me?
Again, I’m not trying to make you feel guilty if you can’t buy from a local store. But if you have the money and want to support independent bookstores, but there’s not one nearby, most indie stores ship widely. You can either order directly from their website, or order it through IndieBound, which does take a percentage of profits. This is especially handy if you have a favorite author going on tour but not stopping near you—many bookstores they stop at will have signed copies available to purchase!
Amazon has the book sooner?
Then REALLY don’t buy it! Not to go too deep into the publishing world, but especially for big-name books, publishers usually place an “embargo” on selling the book with strict consequences. Basically, indie bookstores receive the shipment of books a few days before the book is released. If they were to start selling them early, the publisher is within its rights to refuse to send the store the next shipment of books on time for publication date, meaning the store would lose sales next time because it won’t have the books that first week.
The main reason for this is that when a book has a clearly defined release date, early sales including pre-orders count toward the first week’s sales, giving the book a bump that may land them on the List. But if that release date gets spread out more, it weakens the splash the book might make, so publishers are keen to enforce that clear release week. But Amazon, because of its size and influence, is able to ignore these rules. This happened most recently with Margaret Atwood’s highly anticipated sequel The Testaments, when over 800 customers received their pre-ordered copies a week before the release date. Amazon apologized and said it was due to a “technical error,” but despite breaking the embargo on one of the year’s most tightly regulated books, it will likely not face any consequences, because no publishers are willing to deny Amazon access to their next release.
It’s cheaper online?
Again, if that’s the only way you can afford it, then I get it! Buying a book to read it is better than not reading it at all, and also better than pirating the book for free. The reason online and big box retailers are often able to sell books at a lower cost is because they are taking a loss on it, in hopes that once people are in the store to buy it, they’ll buy other things as well. They can afford to lose money on books, because they sell many things besides books. Bookstores, of course, can’t lose profit on every book they sell since it’s primarily the only thing they sell.
Again, I’m not trying to make anyone feel guilty. But this Christmas as you’re buying gifts, consider shopping at local bookstores if you’re able, and give back to authors and your local economy.
Where do you like to buy books? What’s the name of your favorite bookstore? Let me know in the comments!
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Featured image by Kévin Langlais