The return of the booksellers’ tunga – 04/23/2024 – Elio Gaspari

The old idea of ​​tabulating the books reappeared in the Senate. It has been circulating for more than ten years and, in 2018, it was close to leaving, making its way through the darkness of Brasília. It is a special case of pricing, because while the custom is to price a commodity to prevent it from being overcharged, in this case the intention is to prevent the merchant from charging less.

This time the attempt at tabulation comes from the Senate. There, Senator Teresa Leitão unarchived an old project, proposing that, when launching a book, the publisher establishes a price. In the first 12 months, bookstores cannot offer discounts greater than 10%. It goes further: in a second edition, the schedule would be in force for another six months.

In the last century, a young man named Jeff Bezos worked in the financial market and wanted to change his life. He went to a series of lectures by publishers and booksellers, was surprised by the imperfection of that market and had an idea: he founded Amazon.

He started out in a warehouse in Seattle selling books online and he got there. Bezos revolutionized the book market and retail itself. Fast delivery and offers discounts. Today Amazon is the largest bookstore in the world. It is estimated that it has conquered half of the book market in Brazil. In its wake, publishers and other companies created online sales services. Some, like the Americanas retail chain, found themselves in the water. He went to see, and the network had been looted.

All retail trade goes through the process of creative destruction of capitalism. At first, supermarkets took a share of commerce from street shops. Then came e-commerce, redesigning the sale of books and shampoos, but only booksellers want to price their products.

Booksellers have an apostolic aura. After all, a book would not be a soap. Illusion. Books, soap and trucks are commodities. So much so that, many years ago, when it was cheaper to print a book in China, some publishers started to print them in Shanghai, bringing the volumes to Brazil. The two largest national bookstore chains went bankrupt, much more because of their financial acrobatics than because of their competition. When the big chains drowned out the small bookstores, nobody talked about pricing.

It is complained that the customer goes to a bookstore, consults the volumes and, upon returning home, orders them electronically. The traders who make this complaint shop online and don’t think about pricing the sandwiches. Furthermore, all major publishers have electronic sales operations. If they charge more or force the sale of physical books to the detriment of (cheaper) e-books, that’s their problem.

Book tabulation exists in other countries, such as France, Germany and Spain. The idea is bad, but it must be admitted that these nations work well. It would also be worth copying their public health and education systems. By just copying the tabulation of the books, Brazil would be chasing after a past jaboticaba. The worst is replicated, the new is repressed.