The Amazon glitch wasn’t a “typo”. It was an error, sure, but “typo” is inaccurate I believe.

An error is still false advertising, but it may not be considered actionable which is fine. The problem is when people drive for hours or spend hours online to shop for these products and then get told it’s a mistake. It’s not fair to them, but a business needs to protect itself from huge losses as well.

Amazon handled this very well and I think they went above and beyond with the $25 credits.

It might affect their Internet-only Graphic Books list, but I wouldn’t expect this to move the needle on the real fiction bestseller list. Even the bottom slot of the main list requires a sales velocity of thousands of books a week, and I very much doubt Amazon had more than a couple of hundred copies in stock of any of these books. The Times also has a strong preference towards books that are selling well across all reporting outlets, so they might not even show up on the Graphic Books list.

Jenny Christopher wrote: “Amazon paid for the books when they were shipped to the warehouse.”
ummmm- no, they didn’t. Just like Barnes and Noble, Amazon.com brings in stock on a returnable basis.

Without giving away any trade secrets, this is not necessarily the case. Brick & mortar stores do generally buy returnable, but Amazon’s model is not the same, and they buy primarily or exclusively non-returnable from many publishers. And, either way, that side-steps the issue — Amazon was invoiced based on the retail price of the book, and whether they paid net 30, net 90, or whatever, they still will be paying for books that they’ve already shipped…since they clearly can’t return those to DBD.

The law states that retailers do not have to honor typos. An error is not considered false advertising.

“I am confident that this was indeed a glitch, and no hacking was involved.”

And she said more.

Jenny, in no way did I want to indicate that I thought it was the Diamond employees who possibly could have hacked the Amazon site. I apologize to you and them if that’s how it read.

My thought was that with all the hacking that has been going on in the last couple years, it was possible someone hacked Amazon.

Companies can return product, but usually pay shipping (as well as payroll costs for the handling). Some publishers/distributors limit the amount of product which can be returned. Returns are credited to the retailer’s account, to be used on the next purchase.

I understand publisher’s concerns. However, those books have shipped to Amazon’s warehouses. They have been invoiced. Most likely paid for (ninety days). Until Amazon returns stock, Diamond and publishers keep the money. (Diamond still keeps the money, since returns are credited to the account. No money gets sent back to Amazon.) It’s like the Direct Market: publishers are selling books to Amazon, not to readers. Publishers hope that Amazon will sell the books to customers and thus not have to fret about returns. Amazon themselves hope to sell the book to a customer, and not have to return the book, which costs money.

Long term, yes, publishers should worry. I do not want to see another LPC-style bankruptcy, which could happen if Diamond loses clients to other distributors.

DBD staff does great work! John Shableski is a powerhouse of promotion, promoting graphic novels to librarians nationwide! As a Seducer of the Innocent, I want Diamond to succeed!

As the publisher of one of those DBD clients (About Comics), I’m going to have to disagree. Amazon is our biggest single outlet; on some of our backlist, their ongoing orders far outstrip the entire direct market. Even if the book is available from a third-party seller, that does not mean that someone who would’ve ordered through Amazon themselves will shift to ordering through a third-party seller. I myself am much more reluctant to order through a third-party seller, given Amazon’s own reliability and the free shipping that is available. Additionally, one cannot place preorders through third-party sellers.

Meanwhile, the customers who wanted these discount books get $25 credit -that cannot be currently used on the books that were discounted-, as the coupon is only allowed on items to be shipped by Amazon, not third parties. So the real winner is DC Comics, who didn’t have any of the misdiscounted product and whose works are now available to those comics fans for whom the $25 credit may be burning a whole in their virtual pocket.

Hello,

We wanted to follow up on a recent message we sent about the cancellation of your recent order.

To recap: Due to a pricing error, we sold many more graphic novels than expected. In fact, we completely sold out — we don’t have any in stock right now, and we’re not sure when we’ll be able to get more.

We’re sorry for any frustration the issue may have caused, and have applied a $25 promotional certificate to your account.

You can use it the next time you order an item shipped and sold by Amazon.com. You’ll see your available promotional balance at checkout–this amount will be applied to your next order automatically without entering a claim code.

I hope this helps. We look forward to seeing you again soon.

Sincerely,

Customer Service
Amazon.com
http://www.amazon.com/

“Short term, the lack of Amazon buttons does not affect Marvel, Image, Dark Horse, or any of the other DBD clients.”
Doesn’t it? From what I understand all of these publishers had a number of books basically frozen until this issue was resolved. Amazon is one of the top 3 Mass Market accounts for book distributors, and to lose a few days sales can amount to losses of tens of thousands of dollars.

I am confident that this was indeed a glitch, and no hacking was involved. Especially from the 3 LAID OFF(not fired)employees at DBD. I personally know and have worked with all 3 of the people laid off, and for people to sling those types of theories around, while entertaining, does nothing to get to the core problem of how to prevent these issues before they occur.
Say what you will about Diamond, but Diamond employees are some of the hardest working comic-loving people I know. Employees do get disgruntled, but there is nobody I know working there that would maliciously corrupt data to “stick it to the man”.

For SOME people, yes.

“But it went first come, first serve (cause I’m sure they could see exactly who’s orders came in first) until they ran out of the stock.”

Sounds like it, yeah.

“I’m sure you saw Rich Johnston’s post giving the numbers of books ordered. ”

Must have missed it.

“Those first in line always get the stuff, and Amazon in no way has to hold the price for books they don’t have or expect to get.”

Yes, that’s usually how it goes. However, it looked like orders were still being placed and confirmed after the stock had been depleted or else everyone who placed an order would have had it honored. That’s what bothers me most. There’s apparently some lag time. I think they should honor all of the orders placed at the reduced price if they would be able to restock.

Would Amazon not honoring those sales change my opinion of Amazon or cause me to shop elsewhere? No, and I think they’re being very nice by sending out $25 credit vouchers.

“Now if the books were routinely priced at that point, would they sell better? Not clear — the perception of saving more than usual was definitely a motivation.”

Depends on what you mean by “routinely.” If every year around this time Amazon priced GNs and TPBs at incredibly low prices, they’d probably see a lot of sales. This was the comics version of Black Friday. $30 SRP dvds selling for $5, etc. Using that scale, a $100 Omnibus would be $15-18 which reflects this sale. However, just like with Black Friday, quantities are limited and it’s first come first served. I think DVDs have a higher initial mark-up than books and GNs, though, which allows retailers to have sales like that on Black Friday.

I didn’t place an order during this madness because I knew it was a glitch, and I figured it would be a waste of time. Turns out I might have gotten a $25 voucher for my time, but I don’t really regret not placing an order. I would have loved some Creepy/Eerie Archives for $15 each though.