Unbound Edition - Harry Potter and the Deathly Discounts

A mere 38 days, 9 hours and a few minutes (check out the handy countdown here) left until Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows is released to the world. Oh, the excitement! And hopefully by July 24th, I will begin hibernating with my copy.

I heart Harry Potter, but not enough heart to stay up until midnight to dress up as Hermione Granger and fight off little kids to get my hands on this one. Instead, I opted to wait a few extra days for Amazon to ship me my copy of his final adventure. I will just have to pray that no one spoils the ending for me in the meantime. And the best part of it all (except that I get to read it) is that I paid only $18 on Amazon to pre-order my copy AND if the price drops even lower before the release date, I will get a price adjustment. Woo Hoo! Not only am I getting the book for about half its suggested price, but if the price war heats up I will be the one laughing on the way to the bank.

Obviously, I am super excited that all of the large booksellers chose to compete with one another by slashing the suggested price in half. I win, they lose. But what are they thinking? Harry is like crack for us crazy fans; we can’t get enough of the stuff and will most definitely pay for it. There are so many fanatic fans out there who would have no problem dropping $35 to get their copy right away. And yet, in the midst of this frenzy, booksellers are actually slashing the price to convince an already loyal group of enthusiasts to stick around for the finale?

I am a regular Amazon user; it is easy and convenient for me. The cost of one book is not going to change my choice of bookstore. I preordered the book at $18, but I certainly would have preordered it at $25, or even at full price for $35. So why, booksellers, why did you force this loss upon yourselves?

Regardless of the reasons, I thank you and my wallet thanks you. But if J.K. Rowling kills off Harry, Ron or Hermione I might just have to hibernate for an extra day.

...
written by Neville Longbottom, June 12, 2007 03:58 PM

J.K. better not kill them off - Dumbledore was devastating enough.

my demands
written by BobDoleSez, June 12, 2007 04:28 PM

BobDoleSez: what happened to supply and demand?

Der.
written by Shrunken Head, June 12, 2007 05:00 PM

No kidding. This is the most anticipated book in history, and so of course it makes PERFECT sense to assume that no one would pay top price for it. Dumb move, booksellers. But like Gina says, it just saves the rest of us money.

Oh, and Hagrid is totally going to eat it.

Shrunken Head,
written by Neville Longbottom, June 13, 2007 08:46 AM

say it ain't so.

Magic traffic maker...
written by Eric, June 13, 2007 09:14 AM

Curses, Gina, you beat me to the Harry Potter article.

Independent booksellers are bemoaning the deep discounting. In this article, I found a couple of interesting points:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070611/en_nm/retail_harrypotter_dc

To BobDoleSez' supply and demand question, I'd offer the fact that Scholastic is releasing 12 million copies of the book. With a print run like that, the ubiquity of the book means you might as well title it "Harry Potter is the Hardback Toilet Paper." It's a flood of first editions.

But one more interesting note in that article is the following quote:

"Such price cuts drive sales, but usually result in minimal profit margin, something Jefferies & Co analyst & Co. analyst Tim Allen said typically happens on every bestseller. "It's so discounted, there's minimal, if any, gain," Allen said. "Retailers try to make up the shortfall by marketing loyalty cards, which they hope will entice shoppers back into their store."

It's really not about Potter Profit Margin at all, it's about traffic to the store. Or, in the case of the online retailers, big traffic boosts to the website. You can buy traffic to a website in a lot of ways, but offering a deep discount on a big-name book is just as effective a method as any, plus it gives you an entry point into the interests of the visitors.

At that point, the game is about the sticky technologies in the shopping cart software that somehow leave you purchasing not only a Harry Potter book, but also a box of Earl Grey tea, an old Smiths CD, and "The History of Manchester as Seen Through Its Orphaned Cats."

E.