Just days before the bombshell Barnes &Noble agreement to acquire Ingram, officials from the wholesaler's Spring Arbor unit heard an array of complaints from Christian retailers and publishers gathered at the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association Fall Seminar in Squaw Valley, Calif., about Spring Arbor's service ever since Ingram acquired the largest religious wholesaler last April (News, Apr. 21, 1997).
The '98 seminar was the largest in ECPA history, with approximately 25 stores and more than 250 people in attendance, almost all of them armed with distribution war stories. While there were some humorous quips ("J-I-T d sn't mean 'just in time' anymore, now it means 'just isn't there' "), such light moments were few. Beyond the problem of getting inventory into and out of the Ingram/Spring Arbor system in a timely fashion, publisher complaints focused on the practice of payment-by-returns, shortage claims procedures and shortage reserve certification, the condition of returned stock, delays in accounts payable and slow account reconciliation.
At an open lunch panel, five members of the ECPA board joined Larry Carpenter, I/SA president, and Allen Knight, senior v-p, in a q&a session. Knight distributed an eight-page status report on I/SA's attempts to relieve the difficulties. Doug Ross, ECPA president, closed the session by reporting that both Zondervan and NelsonWord have on-site representatives at I/SA; the two companies are splitting the salaries of these representatives, who serve as ombudsmen for the publishers, with I/SA. Ross suggested that ECPA could facilitate such an arrangement for other member-houses that want to share an ombudsman with other members.
After the meeting, several publishers -- none of whom would speak on the record -- expressed their dissatisfaction, saying, "What we just heard is that it's Ingram's way or no way." Others more amicably suggested to PW that the role of the distributor is undergoing redefinition and that I/SA must begin to deliver some value-added results if it wants to maintain its central position in the industry. Don Cooper, president of Servant Publications and current president of the ECPA board, was more positive about a resolution, observing that he was "very confident that within the next six months we'll see some of the major hurdles like account reconciliation and shortage claims worked out."
Ross emphasized ECPA's role as mediator between angry publishers and their largest distributor. "There has never been such a tumultuous time in our industry's history," he said. "The changes have been cataclysmic, and everybody is going to have to realize that if we don't see progress in the next six to nine months, the environment will not be nearly as friendly."
