1. A couple of years ago, W.H. Smith decided that they liked a particular book of ours: Francis Plug. They brought several hundred copies in at a very high discount (I do not have precise numbers, but we are looking at approaching 60%, possibly more).
2. In addition to the discount, WH Smith asked for a 'bonus' for every book they sold. Again, no exact figures to hand, but anything from around 30-70 pence. This was for a £7.99, £8.99 book. You do the maths on what comes back to the publisher/author.
3. And bear in mind that this is standard practice.
4. Anyway, we thought we needed to say yes. It was a bad deal - but nothing that other publishers didn't contend with - and the extra visibility for our author sounded great. New audiences! New readers.
5. What happened next? Nothing. Certainly no sales. Several months later - I think over a year - we suddenly noticed that several hundred returns for Francis Plug had come through. Who from?
6. WH Smith. Of a 400 order, 399 were returned. Our hypothesis was that they'd not even bothered to unpack the books - not a single copy had made it to the shelves. (WH Smith never admitted this; they did however say that selling one copy was *highly unusual*.)
7. This - which WH Smith's wouldn't have had a moment's thought over - nearly bankrupted us. We had to put out a special appeal in our newsletter, and it is only because of the huge generosity of our readers that we survived.
8. As publishers, you are supposed to say nothing about this - but it is crippling to the industry, and devastating to writers.
Repeat: This kind of practice is really bad for literature: for publishers, for writers, readers, and the amazing bookshops that support us and work so hard.
9. So: If the indies band together, the big publishers started saying 'no', & the @Soc_of_Authors started considering what pressure publishers are under, we might be able to do something.
10. Final tweet: Even if you get rid of most of these points - even if those 399 returns didn't happen - discounting at this level can only mean one thing: disaster. So please, let's band together and start doing something.
