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SueLarson	Slowdowns...	#21	[-]
Posts: 1 (10/30/09 17:02:26) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	We also noticed a terrible slow down the last week and a half. Finally yesterday, things started picking up again. Hopefully, it continues. We had the lowest sales this past week then we've had since we first began. Wonder Why?
brainstormer		#22	[-]
Posts: 4 (10/30/09 18:55:09) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	Well, if society is being dumbed down by the powers that be, the large commercial interests who don't want people to stop buying high sodium and hydrogenated fat "food," then it is us bookdealers who have a need to smarten back up! We need to have a concerted effort, even go door to door...how else are we going to sell these books? Who wants to help me canvas my neighborhood?
oddballbooks		#23	[-]
Posts: 279 (10/30/09 22:05:28) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	My sales have been bad on all sites - but Alibris has fallen the farthest. I was going though some old paperwork and looking at how many books I shipped to Sparks last year - had batches going 3 - 4 times a week. Now I am sending one or two books a week - some weeks none. It is getting very scary .... John
IAmTheRealOtherGuy		#24	[-]
Posts: 205 (10/31/09 11:03:26) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	Yeah, I believe this has also been my worst week in the 5 years I've sold on Alibris. This despite a massive review of listings, repricing inventory downward and adding new inventory. I believe people simply have other financial priorities. Here, property taxes are due Monday. Holidays are coming up, but I doubt that much business will be seen in the book market. The government would have us believe the economy is in a recovery stage despite the evidence to the contrary. A third of a million homes are repo'd every month in this country and the commercial property repo's are now just gearing up, and in comparison to what we have and are seeing in residential repo's., the commercial repo financial impact will dwarf what has happened in the residential sector.
oddballbooks		#25	[-]
Posts: 280 (10/31/09 14:05:12) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	Not to mention the 10% official unemployment rate - And if you add those that have fallen off the rolls of the unemployed that number climbs DRAMATICALLY. Then factor in the under-employed. Was talking to a guy here in Los Angeles that has worked for years on film sets doing lighting... this year he has part time temp work at Toys R Us for Christmas and that is the first job he has found since spring. Things are not getting any better in California yet...
Simon		#26	[-]
Posts: 21 (10/31/09 14:56:50) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	My Alibris sales have been declining ever since they redesigned the search page, where the booksellers' descriptions are hidden from view. There's no way to differentiate my books from the schlock offered by other dealers; it was better when their misspellings and ludicrous descriptions were visible for all to see. Most of my orders on Alibris these days come from Borders and Chapters, where I get stiffed with the 20% commission. Last week has been absolutely dismal. However, as I recall, there is usually a slump in October. I'm expecting sales to be quite unpredictable from now until Thanksgiving. When the economy tanked last year, I really expected, after Obama's election, that we would see some real stimulus spending along the lines of the New Deal. Hah! What a joke! The same old Wall street croneys are in power...Larry Summers, Geithner, and their chums at Goldman Sachs. Money shoveled at the banks, and nowt for the common people. The powers-that-be complain we can't afford a national health plan, but no one complains about the expense of conducting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Obama is just putting a black face on American imperialism and oligarchy. What a colossal disappointment he is. Can someone please explain to me why California, with 37 million people, has the same number of Senators as the state of Wyoming, with 533,000? Why does a voter in Wyoming have 50 times the electoral clout of someone in California? What the hell is "democratic" about that? No wonder nothing changes. Last Edited By: Simon 10/31/09 15:26:15. Edited 1 times.
fabficbks	Huh!	#27	[-]
Posts: 26 (11/01/09 10:59:08) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	Er...sure Simon. Like, whatever. Perhaps Simon was overdosed on Halloween candy yesterday when he posted this latest rant. But on the off chance he was actually serious--- California and every other state in the US of A only gets two senators because that's the way it is set up in the Constitution of the US of A. The House of Representatives is apportioned by the population of each state, so California gets many more Representatives in that body than New Mexico or other states with less population. By the way, this nation is not a populous democracy, it happens to be a Republic. There is a difference. You could look it up yourself if you don't believe me. Sales on books are way down this year because the economy is still crushed, and frankly, compared to say, food, clothing, shelter, heat, gas to carry you to a job if you still have one, or to carry you out to apply for a job if you don't have one, happens to be much higher priorities for most people than reading books. Not for me, reading is essential so far as I am concerned, but the overwhelming majority of people don't look at books as being necessary, and in tuff times spending on non-essentials gets cut back dramatically. If and when the economy bounces back then we will see sales bounce back. I think the change in primary listing strategies which Alibris enacted some months back may also be having an adverse effect. It allows bulk sellers with low prices and minimal descriptions to get first run attention from potential book buyers. Those of us who do not sell books for the absolute minimum listing price, and who also provide detailed, accurate descriptions of every single item, tend to get pushed way down the list when titles come up. This system also greatly highlights most of the Alibris warehouse listings as well. While Alibris hasn't yet resorted to the tactic of setting up drop boxes around the country asking people to give them their books on the off chance that these donations might help some nameless charity, at the same time they do offer a bulk warehouse system where individual sellers can ship out tons of their overstock titltes, usually battered and soiled merchandise, as well as stuff that can't be sold any other way, and Alibris will list it and sell it for them, and give them back a percentage of anything that sells. It is to Alibris' benefit to price this stuff really low so it will sell rapidly, and since they make their money mainly on the shipping, there is no incentive to actually list these bulk books at a fair or reasonable price. While on the subject, I will also mention something odd---lately I've been selling books on Half.com. This is astonishing to me because a few years ago I took almost everything off Half.com and listed it elsewhere. I've only got a couple of thousand titles left there; yet beginning late this summer I'm getting a bunch of orders for stuff I considered to be essentially dead stock. My inclination at this point is maybe to list another two or three thousand titles there and see what happens. Anybody else seeing activity from Half.com? ---Bob Jennings Fabulous Fiction Books
tess		#28	[-]
Posts: 19 (11/01/09 14:32:26) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	I think we can pretty much count on this recession/depression taking a fearsome toll on our sector. On the one hand, there are fewer sales which will in turn push some marginal operations out of business. On the other hand, with so many people out of work, they will turn to selling this and that in the informal sector (ebay and the book sites) to try to pick up a few bucks. So, more stuff will be listed, prices will be further depressed, and the misery some of us are feeling now will be compounded. My rather gloomy forecast: If you are lucky enough to be selling better books ($30 and up), your business may limp along and survive the bad times, if the recession ends in the next year or two. And if your spouse has a regular job (and keeps it), you may get by more comfortably. If you are totally dependent on selling very cheap books, you may be seeing just the beginning of the bad times.
Simon	RE	#29	[-]
Posts: 22 (11/01/09 15:43:37) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	Gee, thanks for the civics lesson, Bob. Like I wasn't aware that this is a Republic... When Americans go guns blasting into places like Iraq and Afghanistan, I don't remember our political leaders and the mainstream media propagandizing about spreading constitutional republicanism around the world. I do hear a lot of empty rhetoric about spreading democracy around the world. Maybe we could use some democracy here, before we embark on our missionary activities abroad, eh? Just because the Constitution established the Senate doesn't mean that the institution is appropriate in this day and age.. I'm not a constitutional fundamentalist--it can be, and has been, amended. Obviously, from the way you dodged the issue, you think it's appropriate that a California citizen has 1/50th of the political clout of someone in Wyoming. I'm just pointing to that obvious inequity. I don't like the fact that conservative, fetus-loving, gay-bashing, churchgoing weirdos in small rural states call the shots in Washington. Their influence is completely out of proportion to their numbers. The Senate is an anti-democratic institution that should be abolished. It would take a revolution to accomplish that... Back on topic: No, I don't sell on Half.com. I just don't have the patience to upload books there manually; how do you upload your books to Half.com? Through Alibris? I couldn't stomach paying the 20% commission. Incidentally, didn't Alibris announce, some six months ago or so, that there was going to be a partnership with ebay, that our listings were going to appear there, too? Or did I hallucinate that? Can anyone report sales on ebay through an Alibris partnership?
fabficbks	half.com listings/ebay listings	#30	[-]
Posts: 27 (11/02/09 06:02:43) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	I don't mind manually listing books on Half.com. Manually listing there is no worse than manually listing books on Alibris or anywhere else, or into a book data base. At some point you have to sit down and actually enter info in to a system, any system, about the book you want to sell. My grype with the Half.com system has been that their system only covers mainstream titles with ISBNs. A considerable amount of my material is older and has no ISBNs, or is small press or odd press and so never shows up in their system and can't be listed there. Then a few years ago it seemed that everybody selling books dropped the prices there to seventy five cents or even lower, sales dropped dramatically, and I pulled most of my listings off. As mentioned, I still have a few thousand books there, and of late sales have picked up. You are right about the eBay hype. Alibris listings on eBay was supposed to be up and running by this summer or thereabouts if I recall correctly. Whatever did happen to that project? I haven't heard a word about it in a long time now. ---Bob Jennings
djclausewitz	October sales	#31	[-]
Posts: 64 (11/02/09 06:50:17) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	I get a steady trickle of half.com orders via Alibris. Virtually all of them are low priced paperbacks and most of them are the kind a student would order - not textbooks but other readings.. I have gotten at least one - maybe two orders from ebay soon after the Alibris announcement but nothing in a while. October is usually a less active month and it has been for me too. However, I have had a pretty steady flow (for me) of low priced ($1.99 - 5.95) paperback and clearance sale book sales. Also the middle range good stuff ($15 - 40) has started to pick up as I think (as some newspaper articles have reported) the early Christmas shoppers are starting to appear. E.g. I have been getting orders for out of print military history first editions, fine in nr fine dj or better, from women. I assume most of these (but not necessarily all) are purchased as gifts. I don't mean to sound as if things are great. Frankly, if I had to depend solely on book income I would be in a hopeless situation. I learned a long time ago that the same amount of intelligence and hard work that makes for a survivable income in the used book business will make you triple or more in some other field - so if there is something else you like and can find the right conditions to do it in that is what you should do full time. (For those of you who might be thinking "Oh no, a part time penny seller!" I have over 9,000 books online and pretty regularly sell books in the above mentioned middle range and the $60 - 300 range is not unfamiliar to me.) That said, I think what is destroying the viability of online bookselling is mostly the competition. It doesn't take much money to get in. Knowledge used to be a barrier to entry but bar code readers and the internet have reduced that barrier and there is always the invincible ignorance of the megalisters. I think the bad economy changes the types of books ordered (more "used" less "rare") but that the bad economy alone doesn't kill sales. Many people turn to used books to save money in bad times. However, I agree that the bad economy does bring in more dealers which increases competition and drives down prices. Recently, there was a man I had never seen before at my neighborhood library weekly sale doing a very good impression of a human vacuum cleaner with his bar code reader and a big box. He was well groomed, dressed in the kind of dress pants and a white dress shirt that probably went with the suit jacket and tie he left at home. Despite his vacuuming efforts he was unfailingly polite and considerate to all. I hope he finds a new job in his former field soon.
M5453	First Time Occurrence...	#32	[-]
Posts: 1268 (11/02/09 08:52:30) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	Not a single Alibris order over the weekend. This has NEVER happened to us before...
IAmTheRealOtherGuy		#33	[-]
Posts: 207 (11/02/09 13:11:15) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	djclausewitz, I know what you mean about the scanner people at sales. I'm considering acquiring a jammer. These people come through and just rape library and private sales.
DrZilboorg		#34	[-]
Posts: 263 (11/02/09 13:20:54) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	Alibris listings are visible on eBay, through HDC. We discussed this a while ago on that board. My sales here have been steady since I dropped to the <1000 inventory level (here) and pay the extra vigorish: about 1 a month. Books under $11.50 or so aren't seen here. My sales overall since this thread started in June have been keeping up with last year, same time. Most weeks I've met my goals which are some 15% higher than last year, but some weeks I haven't. What am I doing differently? I don't list manually to any site--I list to a service and it handles my inventory on the multiple sites I list to. I don't use a scanner, but just last week I decided that I really wished I had one because the FOL I work for has decided to discard some 400 cases of books and allow me to take what I want from them before I load them on the semi bound for Amish country and god knows where after that. So it's on the list. I pay attention to the eBay Booksellers board--it's a most knowledgable crew (despite the overabundance of lunatic liberals over there) and has taught me a great deal about what to pick and what not to pick. On a weekly basis I try to review the top 100 best sellers on the Amazon list and so I can stop buying what isn't moving fast in popular titles. The only other thing I'm doing right now is building more shelf space so I can store more books longer. This is not my soul source of income but since my day job was eliminated by the recession it sure has become more important to me.
Bookfynder3	Jammers?	#35	[-]
Posts: 1520 (11/03/09 05:08:48) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	Re the post about "jamming" scanners. Is there such a machine? I've never heard about one, but I'd love to use one...if there was one. I suspect there isn't one on the market, or that it would be expensive if there actually is one. -- Gary
Joyful Alternative	Order Drought	#36	[-]
Posts: 129 (11/03/09 09:18:00) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	http://alibrisdealersforum.yuku.com/reply/9983/t/Order-Drought.html#reply-9983 I've got the same complaint about Half: half of what I list can't be listed there because there's no ISBN, and for much of the rest, the ISBN gives me the wrong book or edition or publishing details. And when Half developed the habit of selling again what it already sold, a couple of years ago, it was too much trouble and I put it all on hold, where it still is, as far as I know. I've sold maybe a book a year through Half via Alibris. What's surprises me is how many Borders orders I get. The financial news had them about to go out of business, but I keep sending them a trickle of commissions, more than to any of the other Alibris partners. I had to go on a short-notice "vacation," and since I got back last week, the Alibris group has been puttering along as usual, but Amazon has died on me, with only one order, which really hurts. Longer term, I've been upset by the price drop in old academic books, the kind of OOP a graduate student buys for $10 or $20 for research and a staple for me. The penny sellers seem to have invaded the niche, with duplicate 19 cent listings and the like. I sat here listing last night, trying to figure whether at 1,403,857 sales rank with 6 small-change listers I can get my $2.95 within a year. I hope it's just the box I've been listing from. I'm glad to have another small business to pay the mortgage, because my online bookselling business won't do that anytime soon.
IAmTheRealOtherGuy		#37	[-]
Posts: 208 (11/03/09 14:07:46) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	Bookfynder3 - Jammers are available from several sources in various configurations. Search the internet.
Bookfynder3	Finally...	#38	[-]
Posts: 1523 (11/16/09 08:15:33) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	...just sold a $12.50 book via Alibris (for B&N). It's my first sale since Oct. 22!!! Partly my fault, well, actually probably totally my fault, since I'm hobbled up and add very few books to my inventory these days. But still, this is slower than slow. I'll ride it out for awhile but if it doesn't get better I may simply switch to sites which don't charge ANY listing fees. Won't sell much, but won't have the sites (in my case, that's Alibris) hit my credit card. -- Gary
MSager46	Slow Sales	#39	[-]
Posts: 555 (11/16/09 11:11:58) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	Sales seem to have dropped off the last ten days of October. They have started to pick up last week, with what I assume to be Christmas items. This is across the board, on all sites and not unique to any one site. The boards on the other sites, including the Chrislands talk group, are all talking about the drop in sales. My own feeling is that people are aware that Christmas is coming and they are saving their buying for gifts they need. I know I have cut back on spending, pending the coming gift-giving season. Despite the news reports that the recession is easing, I still feel it at my level. It has not filtered down to the small business person, let alone Joe Schmoe on the street.
tess		#40	[-]
Posts: 21 (11/16/09 19:06:41) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	We have some odd experiences with order flow. We can have a very poor week, where we feel as though Alibris has ceased to love us and may in fact be carrying out a vendetta of some kind against us. Followed then by a rush of orders, where we feel the love flow again and even perhaps special treatment from our dear old Alibris, with whom we have listed for nigh on 10 years.... It's kind of, you know, bipolar.

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