Anger at dramatic discounting of Banks' The Quarry

13.06.13 | Lisa Campbell - The Bookseller

Independent booksellers reacted with shock and anger to dramatic reductions yesterday (12th June) in the hardback price of recently deceased Iain Banks’ forthcoming novel The Quarry  by retailers Amazon and Sainsbury’s.

However a spokesperson for Sainsbury's said the price dip was the result of "human error" which had now been corrected.
The author died on Sunday (9th June), two months after he announced he had terminal cancer. His last book The Quarry is published next Thursday (20th June) but Amazon and Sainsbury’s were yesterday offering it for £3.99 on pre-order. The hardback r.r.p is £18.99. Amazon was also offering the Kindle e-book of The Quarry at £3.79, possible since Quarry publisher Little, Brown’s parent company Hachette refined the agency agreement with Amazon in March.

This morning (13th June) both retailers raised their prices once more, with Sainsbury's currently listing it at £9.99 and Amazon's Kindle edition listed at £9.29. Amazon did not respond to a request for comment. However a Sainsbury's spokesperson commented: "Due to human error, and for about 24 hours, Iain Banks’ new book, The Quarry, was incorrectly priced on our website at £3.99.  This mistake has now been rectified and we apologise for any confusion it may have caused.”

Nic Bottomley, owner of Mr B’s Emporium of Reading Delights in Bath, had criticised the dramatic price reduction as a “brazen” move. He said: “I think that is just cynical. I think it is cynical, but you could say predictable. If anything, I think if Amazon gets some bad press from it, it might encourage more customers to buy it from us because of how it looks. It is cashing in on a recently deceased, well-loved author and I think there some customers who would be put off that.”

Sheila O’Reilly, owner of Dulwich Books in London, described the move as “amazing” and “breathtaking”. She said: “There is just no way anyone can compete with that price. They have got to be selling them as a loss-leader.” Keith Smith, owner of Warwick and Kenilworth bookshops, said supermarkets and Amazon sell books for less than the price they buy them for to encourage people to shop at their stores. He said: “If I could sell it at £3.99 I would do very well with it. Amazon can afford to sell it at a loss because they don’t pay enough tax in the UK. It is scandalous.”

However, the booksellers all said they would still stock and sell copies of The Quarry for full r.r.p. O’Reilly added: “E-books are a bigger challenge for us at the moment than heavy discounting of physical books– they seem to be biting more and more onto the print market.”
Tesco, Waterstones and Blackwell’s are pricing The Quarry at £13.99, while Foyles is selling it for £14.43 online. 
Little, Brown has not responded to requests for comment.