A&R's response

[peteryoung]

I've received a pro forma reply from Angus & Robertson, parts of which I have seen quoted elsewhere.

Thank you for your email and for giving me an opportunity to respond to you directly.

I am sorry to hear you no longer wish to shop with us.

I understand that you are concerned about the negotiations that Angus & Robertson is currently seeking with a number of its suppliers. I also understand that the correspondence sent to some of our suppliers has caused offence; I completely acknowledge that the tone of this correspondence was inappropriate, and I appreciate the opportunity to set the record straight on our intentions.

I would like to assure you that these negotiations are not intended to have any impact on Australian authors and are purely about reaching a commercial arrangement with publishers.

Angus & Robertson is a major retailer of Australian titles, with 30% of our top selling books made up by Australian authors. We stock an average of 10,000 individual titles in our smaller stores, considerably more in our larger stores, and over 80,000 active titles across our store portfolio. A substantial proportion of these titles are from Australian authors and publishers, and we maintain an extensive special order service fulfilling our customers’ needs for titles not stocked. It is vital for A&R, and equally in the interests of all Australian authors and publishers that we have a sustainable business that can continue supporting Australian authors and publishing over the long term.

Over the past three years we have invested over $14 million in the growth and expansion of our business to bolster the industry and ensure accessibility and value for our customers. Despite our best efforts, we too are under increasing pressure to survive as we are squeezed by discount department stores and online stores, resulting in our company-owned stores making an operating cash loss this year.

We need to make decisions that ensure we can continue to run a viable business and choosing the right suppliers is part of this. Unfortunately, we cannot work with every publisher in Australia, particularly if the relationship is not commercial.

To give you some context, we currently have 1,200 suppliers to our business and have sent letters to 47 of those whom we hope to hold discussions with over the coming weeks. The payments we have requested from those suppliers represent a gap payment for profits that were lost or costs that were incurred as a result of our commercial relationship with those particular suppliers.

I hope you can understand that we are trying to operate a successful bookstore chain and if we cannot strike a balance that allows us to maintain our retail operations, the impacts on the industry will be far greater if we are forced to close stores or drastically cut down titles.

Again, let me assure you that this is not about penalising authors. It is about establishing commercial arrangements with our suppliers that are viable for both parties and that allow us to offer the best value to our customers.

I do hope that this information may have settled your concerns. I assure you Angus & Robertson remains very committed to selling books from a large range of Australian publishers, large and small. I also assure you that we are dedicated to continuing to provide our customers with a wide variety of books to meet their needs.

Regards
DAVID FENLON| GROUP OPERATING OFFICER | A&R WHITCOULLS GROUP

Comments

[the-magician.livejournal.com]

That *sounds* like quite a reasonable response ... of course we have the usual reality gap in these things between what person A says person B said, what person A infers from what they thought person B said ... and then the inferences made by persons C, D and E who weren't involved in the background to what person B said or is thought to have said.

And then the responses and usual internet explosion of indignation and rumour (as witnessed recently in the "if you have the word lolita in your interests 6A will delete your LJ account without contacting you" rumour)

And given how much Waterstones are reputed to be asking for prime location dump bins during the upcoming Christmas season (costs of £40,000 and above have been bandied around, though I hope that's a chain wide cost and not a per-store one!) I suppose that a bookseller that's making a loss has to ask around to see where it can get money to keep going ... still, it will be interesting to see what happens next!

I'll keep watching in interest!

[dyfferent.livejournal.com]

They should start doing what Waterstones do, which is currently, ordering very tiny suppliers through a second-party wholesaler (who, depending on demand of a specific title, may keep it in stock all the time). The discount is smaller, but it streamlines the entire process.

Are there no book wholesalers in Australia?