Should I be worried?
Amazon is closing its global online book store, Book Depository, on April 26, 2023.
Will this affect you? Probably not.
This Gloucester-based bookseller was founded in 2004 by Stuart Felton and Andrew Crawford, a former Amazon employee, with the mantra of “selling ‘less of more’ rather than ‘more of less’”. It aimed to sell 6m titles covering a wide variety of genres and topics, as opposed to focusing solely on bestsellers.
From their website:
We are a leading international book retailer with a unique offer — over 20 million books and free delivery worldwide (with no minimum spend).
We have offices in London, Gloucester, Madrid, Cape Town and Chennai, and we ship thousands of books every day from our fulfilment centres in United Kingdom, and Australia, to more than 120 countries across the world — displaying prices in 37 different local currencies.
Our vision is to provide “All Books to All” by improving range, access and affordability of books. Within ‘All books’, we strive to offer every book possible, representing the diversity of our customers and authors. Within ‘To All’, we aspire to provide access to millions of books at great prices to customers around the world, whatever their shopping preferences.
Amazon bought the company in 2011, and now in 2023, it is part of Amazon’s cost-cutting measures.
If you live in the United States, this closure probably won’t affect you. But if you live outside the United States, you will no longer have a large selection of books available to you with free shipping.
Interesting article. Cost cutting for profits, inflation and the USA always trying to save the world.”Woe is me.” What’s next?