Ozone hole

News of the book market and electronic book publishing from Vladimir Kharitonov

The American market is growing, but not all. The German market stagnates and nervous. California universities abandoned Elsevier magazines. But the main event of the book industry in Russia in February is, of course, a price war against all that Ozon declared: read about all this in the next issue of our constant section “Books, Money, Eight Bits”, which is conducted by Vladimir Kharitonov.

Russian pricing war

Without especially loud advertising, Ozon, one of the largest online stores in Russia, began to reduce books. Last year’s publications can be found at a price almost 2 times lower than the one at which they are sold in other stores, both the Internet and ordinary ones. No, “reducing prices” is the wrong expression. When the book in the store is sold almost at the vacation price of the publishing house, it is not just a decrease (“Come in, we have 10 rubles cheaper!”), And a full -fledged pricing war with competitors. And immediately with everyone. Of course, the buyer will also pay for delivery. But, given the current price level, the purchase of even two books with delivery will cost the buyer cheaper than going to a regular store. On this Ozone did not stop, and at the end of February the cost of delivery decreased. That is, now the purchase of even one book in Ozone is more profitable than in a bookstore.

But that's not all. Since the Ozon has acquired a control package in Litres, he began to offer books in digital form. Now prices for individual paper books have fallen to the level of prices for electronic ones. So choose: you can buy an e -book for 420 rubles or a paper with delivery tomorrow for 428. And the paper, by the way, consists of atoms that can be touched, they smell with paint and look nice in the hands when you open the book in the subway. Damn complicated choice. My congratulations to Litres.

The first to have alarm were the alarm to bookstores in the regions, which, due to transportation costs, have a margin of books sensitively higher. By mid -February, the capital's book was also recalled. The publishers with whom Ozone is calculated under the already concluded agreements reacted ambiguously to the situation. Someone decided that he was already good: “ozone” pays according to the price list, and what he does there with prices on the site is not a publishing business. Other publishers, mainly with the rapid turnover of books on Ozone, feeling that the price imbalance can put buyers into a dead end and lead to a decrease in revenue from traditional books, began to increase prices for new supplies to Ozone.

Competitors of Ozone also woke up. By the end of February, Labyrinth began to reduce prices in response. The situation in this market, however, is quite confusing thanks to a kind of feudalism: there are publishers on the market who do not sell books on Ozone, and there are others that do not sell books on the Labyrinth.

In this whole story there is one important point for the entire future structure of the Russian book industry. We are talking about the “Marketplais” scheme. Wildberries are already working on it. Since the fall of last year, it goes to marketplace (and very actively, to say aggressively, tries to transfer its suppliers) Ozone. This scheme suggests that the online store, in essence, only ensures the display of the book on the virtual window and the delivery of the book to the buyer. For which he takes his commission (for books - ordinary in world practice 30 %). Prices in Marketplais are determined by the publisher.

It was in Soviet times that the price of the book was printed right on the book itself. Publishers are obliged to do this in those countries where there are fixed books for books (for example, in Germany or in France). For the Russian market, such a situation is not very familiar, since with the disappearance of a centralized purchaser in the person of Soyuzknigi, a book trade in Russia first came to a complete mess, but then gradually simplified the chain “publisher - optovik - bookstore”, in which the wholesaler and bookstore add their price to the vacation price of the publisher. And here you are not Germany with its giant KNV wholesaler, we have a lot of chains, all the publisher cannot control them, and therefore the price of the same book may differ many times in different stores. “Well, what's the case here? - You ask. - The market is! " Of course, the market. Only the market, in which no one, except for very large players (publishers and book networks), can do normal marketing, work with the buyer, including with the help of some understandable and stable prices. What are the stable prices and work with the buyer, if in the same city you can buy a book for 848 (free delivery), 819 (go with your feet), 552 rubles (plus 299 or 199 rubles for delivery depending on the item) or download for 520 rubles? These are some dashing 90s, not the market.

Solving some of his problems-a possible access to an IPO and the need to build a user base, restructuring internal logistics and fighting competitors (well, where without it)-Ozon brought a large confusion to a several bouncer market. But along with this, again made the question of whether it is necessary to discuss how this market should be arranged, and whether we have fixed retail prices, for example? For all its charms, vigor and life, gloomy on the edge, the 90s were admitted a little tedious.

A large sale of textbooks

The American Association of publishers, uniting 1,375 largest and most large publishers of the United States, issued a report over the past year. The usual retail is everything, you won’t believe it, it’s not bad: sales growth by +4.6 % by 2017. The total turnover - about $ 7.8 billion and this height was largely provided (again, like many years ago) by sales of books in binding and audiobooks (sales of the latter grew by 37 %). For the niche Audiobook 2018, was the most successful (and not the last one?) A year in the entire short sales history. But sales of electronic books from these large publishers again decreased, by another 3.6 % compared to 2017. However, this is still more than a billion dollars (or about 13 % of retail).

If everything is so good, then someone is bad? The publishers of textbooks. Last year, their sales from $ 7 billion decreased to $ 6.6 billion (by the way, they have been declining for a year in a row). The worst of all is the case of university publishers and publishers of textbooks for universities. Given the transcendental prices for textbooks, it is not sacred that this is the largest niche, which last year accounted for $ 3.3 billion turnover. However, the publishers of textbooks for schools is also not very good.

What is wrong in the USA with textbooks? Rather, everything is so. American education gradually leaves both paper benefits and commercial suppliers. The training becomes more interactive, as a result of which the need for heavy sheets of treated cellulose is reduced. But the demand for digital support for education is growing. There is already the first swallow to serve from the traditional business of paper textbooks. Well, how's a swallow? Rather, archaeopterix: the largest turnover in the world (6.07 billion USD in 2017), PEARSON, occupying the 1st place in the world ranking of publishers in February sold its unit for private investors for $ 250 million, "moving the focus from textbooks on the number."

But in the number of publishers there is another threat. Unlike paper, the atoms of which cost money, electrons of digital benefits are not worth the money. Almost all costs go to the preparation of educational materials. But this is already quite feasible money for some charitable foundations that have been involved in the creation of such free textbooks for several years. Here, for example, Bill Gates, who financed the online course “Big History” open to students and teachers, according to which one and a half thousand teachers are already teaching and 80 thousand schoolchildren study. Free, of course. The successes of Gates are not too indicative, unlike the activities of the OpenStax Texas Foundation (however, Gates also finances it), 2,2 million students in 48 % of US colleges were used in the last academic year. Open Stax considered that the students saved $ 177 million so much. Apparently, PEARSON and other publishers of textbooks, even if they manage to rebuild, do not pass heavy competition with open and free. And according to tradition, it is necessary to clarify that all this does not concern the publishing house "Education", which - and its owners - for a long time will be fine without any of these nonsense.

Open access is a matter of principle

And there will clearly be more “nonsense”. The library of the university system of California (this is already 10 universities, including Berkeley, Davis, Irvain, San Francisco, etc.) announced that negotiations with the Elsevier publishing house ended unsuccessfully, and it stops the subscription to the academic magazines of the publishing house. The library wanted, in exchange for a subscription on which the library was spending $ 11 million annually, Elsevier provides open access to the publications of scientific articles of university employees (and this is 10 % of all US scientific publications). Elsevier considered these requirements excessive and insolvent and refused. Employees and students will have access (subscription to magazines for a long time electronic) to articles published until 2019. In addition, the library promises to help in every way with access to fresh articles. In general, students and employees will somehow survive without fresh Elsevier magazines. For the scientific community, in essence, this is a matter of principle. The Elsevier business, as his librarians describe, “absurdly profitable”, and therefore should change, or scientists will do without it.

Now the publisher, receiving articles from scientists for free, earns them three times, or even four times: the authors pay for open access, the libraries pay for the subscription (it is noteworthy that none of the richest universities in the United States is able to subscribe to all Elsevier magazines-too expensive), the publisher receives some money for licensing of repeated publications and translations. And in addition to these income, Elsevier learned to be not only the publisher, but also the commercial supplier of analytical information based on publications in his magazines. The University of California decided that he was enough. Elsevier decided, unlike their colleagues from Wiley, who managed to agree with Germany’s universities for open access, not to concede. This battle of giants, of course, will end sooner or later, and scientists will win as producers of scientific knowledge. The international movement of open access to scientific knowledge is not going to dwell. Another thing is interesting: what kind of this victory will be? Will publishes be able to adapt? Or die out for unnecessary?

Not very German quality

On February 14, all German publishers were a lot of nervous: the largest book guard of Germany KNV Group submitted a bankruptcy statement and is trying to restructure. KOCH, NEFF und Volckmar is something like a Soyuzniga, but only with 5,000 publishers-suppliers, 5,600 books-recipients in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, plus another 7,000 points of smaller books. How does an ordinary German publisher live? He prints a book, gives it to KNV's delicate hands and, in general, sleeps calmly further, because all the stores will order his book, KNV will bring them, and the shops will sell it. With the latter in Germany in 2018, it was not too rosy (sales growth is less than 1 %), but stable. And here it is. Börsenverein, the association of German publishers, has already stated: everything is wonderful, we understand, dear publishers, sleep further, this is “not connected with the demand for books”, but exclusively with the price of diesel fuel and the mistakes of some managers (but they have already quit!). And, most importantly, supply books in KNV and further! Publishers, however, are no longer very sure that they can sleep calmly. If KNV collapses, then who will satisfy this stable demand for books? Amazon, or what?

And about sad

On February 1, Vladimir Prokhorenkov, 20 years old, the former editor of his website The-EBook announced the closure of the project. The-eBook was one of the very first (if not the first) sites in Russian dedicated to electronic books. There were still no bookders, online stores, but there were already ridiculous label devices for geeks on which you could already read something, their not very convenient formats of electronic books and programs for their production. And a terrible thirst to read these books as it already seemed convenient and know how to do it.

The book industry, as it should be the oldest and most conservative industry, did not even look at e -books down, simply not noticing the new needs of readers. And she was already. At least this need satisfied this need as a place of receipt of operational information, consultations and help from other lovers of books on the screen. As Vladimir Prokhorenkov wrote in the last publication on the site, the project is closed “for several reasons, among which the explanation is important for readers that there is nothing to happen in the field of electronic books, except for a decrease in interest in devices and content.” And in some ways, Vladimir is right: electronic books have long ceased to be exotic and lie almost everyone in their pocket. They became a completely ordinary thing. Type of books. Well, who is especially interested in printing, except for specialists?