The line between selling used and new books continues to blur with the announcement at BookExpo America that Abebooks will officially begin selling new books off its four international sites—abebooks.com, abebooks.co.uk, abebooks.de and abebooks.fr—effective immediately. The company has been selling some new titles on its site for the past three years and estimates that about 10% of its 56 million titles are new books. But with a more aggressive recruiting effort of publishers and booksellers, the company hopes that new books will account for one-third of its listings within three years. Word of Abebooks' pending new books plan first appeared in PW's May 17 Canadian supplement.
Boris Wertz, Abebooks' chief operating officer, said the move into new books "is a natural progression of what we've been doing." He said an Abebooks survey found that 97% of its customers buy new as well as used books, and most customers indicated that they would buy new books from Abebooks if they were available. "Why should we send them to someone else?" Wertz asked. Used and new books will appear together, although the company does plan to add sorting options that will make it possible to search by condition code alone. "New and used books are one market," Wertz said.
Abebooks' new book business model will be the same one used for used books; the company will serve as an intermediary between buyers and sellers and has no plans to become an Amazon or Barnes & Noble.com. "We're not going to warehouse or touch the books," Wertz said. The financial model will also be the same, with a monthly listing fee ranging from $25 to $300 and an 8% commission on each sale.
Wertz said he expects that smaller and independent publishers, which face "distribution challenges," to be the most active in listing their titles with Abebooks. "We don't expect the large publishers to take part," Wertz said. But Abebooks will still be able to carry new titles from major publishers as long as some of the booksellers that list with the company are selling the book. "We will have great breadth and depth" of new books, Wertz predicted. At BEA, Abebooks staff was recruiting both new booksellers and publishers to join the Abebooks marketplace as well as trying to convince existing booksellers to add new titles.
To help create public awareness about the availability of new books on the site, the company is planning a two-month consumer media campaign that will feature ads in book-related magazines such as Harper's and the New Yorker. The ads will feature the company's new slogan, "Because You Read."
Wertz observed that Abebooks' move into new books along with the sale of used books at Amazon and B&N.com "shows that the two markets are moving together."
New from Alibris
Abebooks competitor Alibris said last week that sales of new books through its site passed $5 million last month. Alibris started selling new titles in June 2002, and 200 small publishers now list their books on Alibris.
