'Symbol,' 'Compass’ Reinvigorate Debate on Embargoes, Discounts

The release last week of two of the biggest books of the year—The Lost Symbol and True Compass—once again brought debate about two industry issues: embargoes and deep discount on top titles. Almost exactly two years after the breaking of embargoes on State of Denial and Tough Choices by the New York Times prompted then PW editor-in-chief Sara Nelson to ask what the point of embargoes were, the paper of record did it again with early reviews of Ted Kennedy’s memoir and Dan Brown’s thriller. Over the past two years, embargoes have become more popular—one indie bookseller said he thinks any title with an announced printing of over 100,000 is now embargoed—but they are not better policed. Publishers stand by the practice as a way to build publicity for titles and protect serial deals, while booksellers think they are annoying but don’t hurt sales.

Geoffrey Jennings, co-owner of Rainy Day Books in Fairway, Kans., thinks the practice has been diluted by overuse. But although Jennings has had customers come in asking for embargoed titles they saw on sale before the street date at competitors, he’s not overly concerned about embargoes costing him sales. The new-book purchasing supervisor for Powell’s, Gerry Donaghy, said he’s also less concerned about lost sales with embargoes—“we always honor them,” he said, “even if we hear about big box stores breaking them”—than he is about the paperwork involved. “For the last Stephenie Meyer book, the affidavit we had to sign was four pages long, all basically saying, beyond the usual threat of typical punitive measures [no early shipments], that we could be sued if we sold the book early.”

Independent booksellers are much less understanding about the steep discounts offered on major books. Noting that Target ran an ad in the New York Times promoting Symbol for $16.99—$12.96 off the cover price—Hans Weyandt of Micawber’s in St. Paul said he had no pre-orders for Symbol and sold no copies the day it went on sale. “I can’t compete with that,” he said of the discounts. The situation wasn’t so bleak at all independents, though some thought Random House could have done more to help indies promote Symbol—especially since no galleys were available for them to read or for critics to review. David Didriksen, owner of Willow Books in Acton, Mass., basically supports embargoes except in one area. “I don’t understand why publishers would hold [the book] back from reviewers. It didn’t help sales to have reviews of The Lost Symbol come so late,” he said. Joe Drabyak of Chester County Book & Music Company in West Chester, Pa., offered a 30% discount and sold 26 copies of Symbol on day one. Still, he wondered where Random’s support of indies was. “It would have been nice if there had been something to make a window display,” Drabyak said, speaking in his role as president of the NAIBA.

The discounts made Symbol a record breaker for adult fiction titles at B&N and Amazon, even if both companies left millions of dollars on the table by slashing the price. Random said it sold more than one million copies of Symbol on the first day of sale and went back to press for 600,000 copies to meet demand in North America. Sales of Symbol, however, didn’t approach the fastest-selling book of all-time, which remains Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, which sold 8.3 million copies in its first 24 hours of sale in July 2007.