CotW Thomas Tallis

**teamsaint** · 31-01-25, 13:59

Originally posted by Vox Humana View Post

The days of Amazon offering the best deals is over, it seems. Both versions are cheaper from the publisher, though the hardback is still £108. Anyone else think Academic publishing is a right rip-off? A lot of academics think so.

Academic publishing operates with entirely different rules to trade publishing. Discounts offered by the publishers are very small, and RRPs are sky high. Obviously sales volumes are limited, so publishers need to make big money on every copy sold, I guess. Also, sell- through rates will be low, and consequently storage rates at their distributors will be very high I expect, as stock may take years to sell through.
Strange world, well strange to me at any rate !

**Petrushka** · 31-01-25, 15:26

Originally posted by teamsaint View Post

Academic publishing operates with entirely different rules to trade publishing. Discounts offered by the publishers are very small, and RRPs are sky high. Obviously sales volumes are limited, so publishers need to make big money on every copy sold, I guess. Also, sell- through rates will be low, and consequently storage rates at their distributors will be very high I expect, as stock may take years to sell through.
Strange world, well strange to me at any rate !

I wouldn't expect to pay £228 for a 300 page hardback book unless it was a signed, first edition or had some other distinguishing feature. I've seen signed le Carre first editions of around this price.

It's hardly surprising that stock may take years to sell at such a ridiculous price and all of the author's hard work just goes for nothing and it's the book-buying public who lose out.

**Vox Humana** · 31-01-25, 16:35

Originally posted by Petrushka View Post

It's hardly surprising that stock may take years to sell at such a ridiculous price and all of the author's hard work just goes for nothing and it's the book-buying public who lose out.

I'm gong a bit off topic here, but the pricing structure suggests to me that the hardbacks are aimed principally at libraries and the paperbacks and ebooks at individuals. What really gets me is that bindings of properly stiched gatherings seems to be a thing of the past. Everyone nowadays uses that cheap and nasty PUR binding, which is basically a more sturdy and durable form of perfect binding (as used for popular paperbacks, where the glue often ends up drying and cracking so that the pages fall out). I recently bought the two recent EECM volumes of Early Tudor Organ Music (£185 for both). They are both large oblong, PUR-bound volumes. The pages simply will not stay open on a music desk, so are completely useless from a practical point of view. What on earth was the point of publishing them like that? I also found the same problem with some recent, portrait-format volumes of Howells's piano music published by Novello. The only solution is to photocopy the pages you want to play. I'd love to know what return the publishers make on volumes like these.

**teamsaint** · 31-01-25, 19:14

Originally posted by Petrushka View Post

I wouldn't expect to pay £228 for a 300 page hardback book unless it was a signed, first edition or had some other distinguishing feature. I've seen signed le Carre first editions of around this price.

It's hardly surprising that stock may take years to sell at such a ridiculous price and all of the author's hard work just goes for nothing and it's the book-buying public who lose out.

There just is a very different business model between academic and trade publishing. As VH. suggests, the library business and course recommendations / adoptions have something to do with it.
i have been in trade publishing for 20 years, and academic publishing is a mystery to people like me really .