Amazon is a danger…
Amazon charged third-party vendors $103 billion in fees in 2021, which represents 22% of the company’s revenues. Guess what! Every self-published author and every traditional publisher (even the Big Five) are third-party vendors. This hurts everyone in the publishing business, more self-published authors and small presses than the Big Five publishing conglomerates that just shrug it off as the cost of doing business.
Of course, Amazon has been sticking it to the publishing industry for a long time. They make it out like it’s a “big deal” that they only take 30% royalties (if your ebook is priced at $2.99 or more). That’s the self-published author’s third-party vendors fee. The only thing good about that is the charge is per unit sold, not a one-time fee. (Third-party vendors of toilet plungers and Big Five books probably have an overall fee added to that per unit fee to make up that N%.) Otherwise, authors don’t get many services for that 30% rip-off, nothing worthwhile beyond a place to sell books. Every vendor on Amazon, which includes book vendors, has to pay for ads. (I wonder what percentage of Amazon’s revenue comes from that!)
Amazon is a danger to sellers and consumers for two major reasons: Not only do they make far too much money in third-party fees without offering any useful services, they’re becoming a huge monopoly. The A in USA might become Amazon if present trends continue as far as consumerism goes.
And think about this: Amazon enforces lower prices so that vendors end up paying even more! Consumers might love that, but vendors have to sell more units to stay afloat. This can seem attractive at first for the vendor as well, simply because Amazon’s reach goes far beyond most local distributors, but if the product is a specialized one, i.e. having only a small niche market to begin with, they would be better off creating their own website and selling their products there.
Authors don’t even have access to the meager services Amazon offers them unless they’re exclusive to Amazon. Most would be far better off “going wide,” i.e. avoid Amazon exclusivity and distributing to multiple book retailers and library and lending services (the latter lend books for the price of membership and often have a “to buy” offer if the reader wants to keep the ebook). Multiple retail sites usually imply more product sales in general. This tactic also applies to other product vendors who believe that the Amazon octopus will do so much for their sales that they forget about other retail outlets. Even selling products from a company website can do more than Amazon!
Amazon’s tactic is clear: They’re out to eliminate all competition. It’s a tactic that many big corporations have in this era of multinationals’ excesses and monopolistic attitudes. Giving them free rein to do this cannot be good for the US or the world!
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