So I pre-ordered Ultimate Magic from Amazon, at half the price paizo charges, and now they say that they won't be shipping the book until JULY.
Yay for waiting two months. Idiots.
WTF.
I hate Amazon. Try to get a good deal, and you get screwed. I guess that means the book is really popular.
While supported Paizo is a good idea, I can't justify paying 50 dollars (w/ shipping) for something I can get for much less than that. Grrrrr!
Rant over. For now. lol.
One of the risks of going with amazon on new releases. They are pretty notorious for this sort of thing. For things that have been around a while amazon is usually a great option, but for new books, movies, video games, it normally isn't worth it.
The same thing happened to me when I ordered the hardback books for the core rulebook/bestiary from them.
Apparently the preorder system with Amazon expects an unlimited amount of books from Paizo. There aren't an unlimited number of books, obviously, but Amazon *apparently* doesn't find this out until the books are actually available.
Assuming Amazon doesn't get told this information when preorders are available, can Paizo somehow let Amazon know how many books will be made available to them before they're available. . . or is that simply impossible to know until the books are available?
CEO
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There are plenty of books available to Amazon. They make a guess on how many to purchase and then when sales go over that, they put some far out there release date and they try to get more books. My guess is that that date will all of a sudden turn into to a "available now" date sometime in the next week or so. This is only a guess, as the mechanisms of Amazon are more cryptic than Nordic runes. But there are plenty of books to buy from us, trust me. :)
-Lisa
There are plenty of books available to Amazon. They make a guess on how many to purchase and then when sales go over that, they put some far out there release date and they try to get more books. My guess is that that date will all of a sudden turn into to a "available now" date sometime in the next week or so. This is only a guess, as the mechanisms of Amazon are more cryptic than Nordic runes. But there are plenty of books to buy from us, trust me. :) -Lisa
Bingo! Boss lady gets it in one. There's an initial order placed from the distributor, which tries to cover pre-orders. The folks working book ordering don't re-evaluate how much they need till usually well past when they should've. So the system recalculates based on a re-order. Giving that incredibly crazy far out date.
Once the reorder arrives, the system recalculates the date on the site and orders get pushed out as the new stock is replenished 'ahead' of the estimated date customers can see.
It works better when certain people pay closer attention to the stuff they should be, but RPG books while briefly can top their categories in sales, still aren't the priority to those folks that say, the next big tell all book is.
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CEO
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I sure hope you are right Lisa!
I just placed my order for Ultimate Magic from Barns and Noble.com and they now say the book will ship on June 7th!
June 7th!
Hopefully some time later this week, once the book actually releases, that date will change!
Barnes and Noble is a much bigger crap shoot than Amazon. Sometimes they get an order in early. Sometimes it is right on schedule. Sometimes it takes months to get their initial order in. And sometimes they just decide to never order a book. And there is no rhyme of reason to which book line or whatnot. Amazon at least orders everything we do.
-Lisa
As long as I've been ordering from them, there's never been a delay like this. Two months?!?!?!? annoying....
Same thing happened with the Inner Sea World Guide for me. That said, I expect Amazon will ship it in about 2 weeks or so. Pay $40+shipping and you can get it quite speedily from Paizo. Pay $26+Shipping and expect delays from Amazon.
Is getting it two months earlier (as I said, I expect it to be available in 2 weeks rather than 2 months) worth $14? If the answer is yes, cancel your Amazon order and get it from Paizo. I personally don't think it is.
wow 25$! now i feel cheated for buying from paizo :( i understand they buy in bulk but geez thats 50%! why do us faithful paizo direct buyers get the hose? this makes me feel like us adventure path subscribers should get more of a discount. or maybe free pdf's of major books... just saying.... come on Lisa throw us a bone :D
Or pay $38 at bookdepository.com with free shipping world wide...
There are plenty of books available to Amazon. They make a guess on how many to purchase and then when sales go over that, they put some far out there release date and they try to get more books. My guess is that that date will all of a sudden turn into to a "available now" date sometime in the next week or so. This is only a guess, as the mechanisms of Amazon are more cryptic than Nordic runes. But there are plenty of books to buy from us, trust me. :)
-Lisa
My issue with them and I have commented on this happening in the past is that in their generic "delayed email" they pretty much blame Paizo and/or the distributor between Paizo and Amazon.
This is from their email that I got today, May 18th, 1 day before I was supposed to get UM from Amazon. They kindly give me ONE day notice its delayed 2 months. I do understand that it might and probably will ship sooner. Many people that order your products through Amazon might read this email and not know to check this site for the actual release date, and they have easily placed the blame on Paizo.
-WHY WAS MY ORDER DELAYED?
While we do our best to adhere to our delivery estimates, our inventory is constantly changing based on information we receive directly from our suppliers. Occasionally, unexpected fluctuations in supply, delays during shipping, or changes in release dates for new products will add time to our original delivery estimate.-
So we have to blame, info from suppliers (not occasionally so must be the main cause), OCCASIONALLY UNEXPECTED fluctuations in supply (thats funny, this happens every time with a new Pathfinder product), delays during shipping ("who ships it? Paizo? oh they must have delayed it"), or CHANGES IN RELEASE DATES FOR NEW PRODUCTS. All those imo point to Paizo.
Yes I know about buying from a store or direct from Paizo, but I placed many orders at the same time with Free Shipping from Amazon almost 6 months ago. Sorry just pissed, again...
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There are plenty of books available to Amazon. They make a guess on how many to purchase and then when sales go over that, they put some far out there release date and they try to get more books. My guess is that that date will all of a sudden turn into to a "available now" date sometime in the next week or so. This is only a guess, as the mechanisms of Amazon are more cryptic than Nordic runes. But there are plenty of books to buy from us, trust me. :)
-Lisa
My issue with them and I have commented on this happening in the past is that in their generic "delayed email" they pretty much blame Paizo and/or the distributor between Paizo and Amazon.
This is from their email that I got today, May 18th, 1 day before I was supposed to get UM from Amazon. They kindly give me ONE day notice its delayed 2 months. I do understand that it might and probably will ship sooner. Many people that order your products through Amazon might read this email and not know to check this site for the actual release date, and they have easily placed the blame on Paizo.
-WHY WAS MY ORDER DELAYED?
While we do our best to adhere to our delivery estimates, our inventory is constantly changing based on information we receive directly from our suppliers. Occasionally, unexpected fluctuations in supply, delays during shipping, or changes in release dates for new products will add time to our original delivery estimate.-So we have to blame, info from suppliers (not occasionally so must be the main cause), OCCASIONALLY UNEXPECTED fluctuations in supply (thats funny, this happens every time with a new Pathfinder product), delays during shipping ("who ships it? Paizo? oh they must have delayed it"), or CHANGES IN RELEASE DATES FOR NEW PRODUCTS. All those imo point to Paizo.
Yes I know about buying from a store or direct from Paizo, but I placed many orders at the same time with Free Shipping from Amazon almost 6 months ago. Sorry just pissed, again...
Duh, what did you expect, a "yes we screwed up, please wait patiently until we get our crap together" e-mail? :)
Duh, what...There are plenty of books available to Amazon. They make a guess on how many to purchase and then when sales go over that, they put some far out there release date and they try to get more books. My guess is that that date will all of a sudden turn into to a "available now" date sometime in the next week or so. This is only a guess, as the mechanisms of Amazon are more cryptic than Nordic runes. But there are plenty of books to buy from us, trust me. :)
-Lisa
My issue with them and I have commented on this happening in the past is that in their generic "delayed email" they pretty much blame Paizo and/or the distributor between Paizo and Amazon.
This is from their email that I got today, May 18th, 1 day before I was supposed to get UM from Amazon. They kindly give me ONE day notice its delayed 2 months. I do understand that it might and probably will ship sooner. Many people that order your products through Amazon might read this email and not know to check this site for the actual release date, and they have easily placed the blame on Paizo.
-WHY WAS MY ORDER DELAYED?
While we do our best to adhere to our delivery estimates, our inventory is constantly changing based on information we receive directly from our suppliers. Occasionally, unexpected fluctuations in supply, delays during shipping, or changes in release dates for new products will add time to our original delivery estimate.-So we have to blame, info from suppliers (not occasionally so must be the main cause), OCCASIONALLY UNEXPECTED fluctuations in supply (thats funny, this happens every time with a new Pathfinder product), delays during shipping ("who ships it? Paizo? oh they must have delayed it"), or CHANGES IN RELEASE DATES FOR NEW PRODUCTS. All those imo point to Paizo.
Yes I know about buying from a store or direct from Paizo, but I placed many orders at the same time with Free Shipping from Amazon almost 6 months ago. Sorry just pissed, again...
I expect them to be not continue this trend. My post is not about the message to me for my problem its about fixing this with Paizo and not blaming them for it. But Duh refers to stupidity so I guess I'm stupid for having issue with Amazon telling their customers is Paizo's fault. Back to school with me.
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...There are plenty of books available to Amazon. They make a guess on how many to purchase and then when sales go over that, they put some far out there release date and they try to get more books. My guess is that that date will all of a sudden turn into to a "available now" date sometime in the next week or so. This is only a guess, as the mechanisms of Amazon are more cryptic than Nordic runes. But there are plenty of books to buy from us, trust me. :)
-Lisa
My issue with them and I have commented on this happening in the past is that in their generic "delayed email" they pretty much blame Paizo and/or the distributor between Paizo and Amazon.
This is from their email that I got today, May 18th, 1 day before I was supposed to get UM from Amazon. They kindly give me ONE day notice its delayed 2 months. I do understand that it might and probably will ship sooner. Many people that order your products through Amazon might read this email and not know to check this site for the actual release date, and they have easily placed the blame on Paizo.
-WHY WAS MY ORDER DELAYED?
While we do our best to adhere to our delivery estimates, our inventory is constantly changing based on information we receive directly from our suppliers. Occasionally, unexpected fluctuations in supply, delays during shipping, or changes in release dates for new products will add time to our original delivery estimate.-So we have to blame, info from suppliers (not occasionally so must be the main cause), OCCASIONALLY UNEXPECTED fluctuations in supply (thats funny, this happens every time with a new Pathfinder product), delays during shipping ("who ships it? Paizo? oh they must have delayed it"), or CHANGES IN RELEASE DATES FOR NEW PRODUCTS. All those imo point to Paizo.
Yes I know about buying from a store or direct from Paizo, but I placed many orders at the same time with Free Shipping from Amazon almost 6 months ago. Sorry just pissed, again...
If you're a company and you can throw the blame on someone else, you'll do so. If you expect integrity and honesty, well, this is capitalism after all. Small companies that get to fight for every customer (Paizo) can focus on ethics, monsters such as Amazon don't need to care.
...There are plenty of books available to Amazon. They make a guess on how many to purchase and then when sales go over that, they put some far out there release date and they try to get more books. My guess is that that date will all of a sudden turn into to a "available now" date sometime in the next week or so. This is only a guess, as the mechanisms of Amazon are more cryptic than Nordic runes. But there are plenty of books to buy from us, trust me. :)
-Lisa
My issue with them and I have commented on this happening in the past is that in their generic "delayed email" they pretty much blame Paizo and/or the distributor between Paizo and Amazon.
This is from their email that I got today, May 18th, 1 day before I was supposed to get UM from Amazon. They kindly give me ONE day notice its delayed 2 months. I do understand that it might and probably will ship sooner. Many people that order your products through Amazon might read this email and not know to check this site for the actual release date, and they have easily placed the blame on Paizo.
-WHY WAS MY ORDER DELAYED?
While we do our best to adhere to our delivery estimates, our inventory is constantly changing based on information we receive directly from our suppliers. Occasionally, unexpected fluctuations in supply, delays during shipping, or changes in release dates for new products will add time to our original delivery estimate.-So we have to blame, info from suppliers (not occasionally so must be the main cause), OCCASIONALLY UNEXPECTED fluctuations in supply (thats funny, this happens every time with a new Pathfinder product), delays during shipping ("who ships it? Paizo? oh they must have delayed it"), or CHANGES IN RELEASE DATES FOR NEW PRODUCTS. All those imo point to Paizo.
Yes I know about buying from a store or direct from Paizo, but I placed many orders at the same time with Free Shipping from Amazon almost 6 months ago. Sorry just pissed,
You are right. Sadly I knew this was gonna happen with this release, just wish it was the last.
I sure hope you are right Lisa!
I just placed my order for Ultimate Magic from Barns and Noble.com and they now say the book will ship on June 7th!
June 7th!
Hopefully some time later this week, once the book actually releases, that date will change!
Barnes and Noble is a much bigger crap shoot than Amazon. Sometimes they get an order in early. Sometimes it is right on schedule. Sometimes it takes months to get their initial order in. And sometimes they just decide to never order a book. And there is no rhyme of reason to which book line or whatnot. Amazon at least orders everything we do.
-Lisa
Having worked for a B&N retailer, my advice to Mark and others like him would be that if you want to go through B&N specifically (to take advantage of membership or whatever), order through a brick and mortar store. That way you talk to a real human being who can see if and when the book will be in a distributor's warehouse and will tell you, whereas the online store will not.
wow 25$! now i feel cheated for buying from paizo :( i understand they buy in bulk but geez thats 50%! why do us faithful paizo direct buyers get the hose? this makes me feel like us adventure path subscribers should get more of a discount. or maybe free pdf's of major books... just saying.... come on Lisa throw us a bone :D
Not a Paizo rep but again speaking as someone who has worked in book retail---Amazon can afford to do that; Paizo and FLGSes normally cannot.
Typical MSRP markup for a book is 30-50%. In other words, if you pay full price for a book, you are paying 30%-50% more than wholesale price. The reason this is so high--to the best of my understanding--is that if a store/distributor orders a lot of books but only sells, say, half, it still at least cuts most of your losses from buying the lot of books. It takes a lot to actually profit from selling books, so the markup is high.
Amazon is such a huge retailer and is run in such a way that they can afford to often knock as much as 30 or 40% off a cover price for a book they want to move quickly, and still be able to earn a profit from the mere 10% or so markup left.
Smaller booksellers simply cannot afford that kind of reduction in markup, however--for them, they cannot sell enough books to make up the difference (or at least, it is way too risky to try). From my limited understanding of this, Paizo actually does pretty well with offering 10-20% off on a lot of the products they sell. If Paizo "threw you a bone" that you ask for, they would lose money, and they certainly are not cheating you. (And subscribers do get free pdfs of the books in the subscription line, so I am not sure what you are talking about there.)
Folks more knowledgeable of this than me are welcome to correct me if I am wrong, and I apologize in advance for any misinformation. I'm just a fellow customer too.
I'm also in the bookindustry, and can relate to what you're writing DeathQuaker.
That being said. At one point you as customer (talking about the OP here) should have learned your lesson. Especially if this happens time and again.
I order alot of books from Amazon, but everything I need (or want) to get in a hurry I usually don't. Unless they have it in stock.
For instance, I buy all my PF stuff right here. Sure it is more expencive, but I know they ship it as soon as they can, and most likely sooner then anywhere else.
I know delayed orders are annoying, but with Amazon, unless they have the product in stock, you kinda have to expect it. That's the price you pay for those low prices :)
For Amazon I would say, if you're buying a book that is a old, say the Bestiary 2, buy Amazon. you'll save 20% and their shipping isn't that slow, and if you buy more than one book you get free shipping. If you want a new book, case in point, buy amazon w/ cheapest shipping and the PDF from Paizo. That's what I'm doing, I'm paying $38 total and I have the PDF too.
I sure hope you are right Lisa!
I just placed my order for Ultimate Magic from Barns and Noble.com and they now say the book will ship on June 7th!
June 7th!
Hopefully some time later this week, once the book actually releases, that date will change!
Barnes and Noble is a much bigger crap shoot than Amazon. Sometimes they get an order in early. Sometimes it is right on schedule. Sometimes it takes months to get their initial order in. And sometimes they just decide to never order a book. And there is no rhyme of reason to which book line or whatnot. Amazon at least orders everything we do.
-Lisa
Having worked for a B&N retailer, my advice to Mark and others like him would be that if you want to go through B&N specifically (to take advantage of membership or whatever), order through a brick and mortar store. That way you talk to a real human being who can see if and when the book will be in a distributor's warehouse and will tell you, whereas the online store will not.
wow 25$! now i feel cheated for buying from paizo :( i understand they buy in bulk but geez thats 50%! why do us faithful paizo direct buyers get the hose? this makes me feel like us adventure path subscribers should get more of a discount. or maybe free pdf's of major books... just saying.... come on Lisa throw us a bone :DNot a Paizo rep but again speaking as someone who has worked in book retail---Amazon can afford to do that; Paizo and FLGSes normally cannot.
Typical MSRP markup for a book is 30-50%. In other words, if you pay full price for a book, you are paying 30%-50% more than wholesale price. The reason this is so high--to the best of my understanding--is that if a store/distributor orders a lot of books but only sells, say, half, it still at least cuts most of your losses from buying the lot of books. It takes a lot to actually profit from selling books, so the markup is high.
Amazon is such a huge retailer...
One little thing to add to this is that Paizo really can't mark down the book anymore with out pissing off a whole bunch of FLGS's. If you are a gaming store and you sell the book at cover price, but you can get the book 30 or 40% off at Paizo's website, why would you carry the book?
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....Alternatively, subscribe to the line, get the physical book shipped to you when it ships to the distributors, and get the .pdf for free.
Lessee...you save $14 (+/- shipping differences) at Amazon.
The .pdf retails for 9.99.
so, $4 seems a fair trade for 2-8 week advance copy "fee."
Plus, Paizo gets more $$, makes more books, etc...
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CEO
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wow 25$! now i feel cheated for buying from paizo :( i understand they buy in bulk but geez thats 50%! why do us faithful paizo direct buyers get the hose? this makes me feel like us adventure path subscribers should get more of a discount. or maybe free pdf's of major books... just saying.... come on Lisa throw us a bone :D
I wish I could find the link, but there was an amazing article in the Wall Street Journal ( I think) that talked about Amazon's business strategy. The fascinating part of it is that Amazon LOSES MONEY on every product they sell that they buy on their own. So how do they stay in business then? They make all their profits on the percentage that they take when a third party business sells THEIR STUFF through Amazon. So when a brick and mortar retail store starts selling through Amazon, the percentage they pay Amazon for that right is what keeps the giant afloat.
The article I saw linked from a brick and mortar retail site and the guy who posted it pointed out that if B&M stores wanted to put Amazon out of business, they should just stop selling through them. But of course, these stores sell a LOT of product through Amazon, so they won't turn off that spigot.
So that means that Amazon is selling Ultimate Magic + shipping at a cost to you that is BELOW what it costs Amazon. I can tell you that Paizo can't afford to do that. We would be in business for all of a month before we went bankrupt. But Amazon can because they drive traffic to their website with all the ridiculously low prices and free shipping and once you are there, you also buy stuff from third part retailers which feeds the machine.
So, no bones, as that would put us out of business. :) Instead, we strive continually to provide the lowest prices that we can and the best quality products and the best customer service.
-Lisa
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CEO
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One little thing to add to this is that Paizo really can't mark down the book anymore with out pissing off a whole bunch of FLGS's. If you are a gaming store and you sell the book at cover price, but you can get the book 30 or 40% off at Paizo's website, why would you carry the book?
+1 to this too! As the publisher of the books in question, it is incumbent upon us to maintain price integrity on our products. Which means that we sell at MSRP with slight discounts to subscribers.
-Lisa
You have the best customer service!!!
wow 25$! now i feel cheated for buying from paizo :( i understand they buy in bulk but geez thats 50%! why do us faithful paizo direct buyers get the hose? this makes me feel like us adventure path subscribers should get more of a discount. or maybe free pdf's of major books... just saying.... come on Lisa throw us a bone :D
I don't think Paizo wants to under cut gaming store. The books in the gaming shops sell for $50. Amazon undercutting gamins stores is bad enough but if the publisher did it too then I'd not stock thier products if I ran gaming shop.
I sure hope you are right Lisa!
I just placed my order for Ultimate Magic from Barns and Noble.com and they now say the book will ship on June 7th!
June 7th!
Hopefully some time later this week, once the book actually releases, that date will change!
Barnes and Noble is a much bigger crap shoot than Amazon. Sometimes they get an order in early. Sometimes it is right on schedule. Sometimes it takes months to get their initial order in. And sometimes they just decide to never order a book. And there is no rhyme of reason to which book line or whatnot. Amazon at least orders everything we do.
-Lisa
Dice just came up snake-eyes. Current shipping date on B&N is July 12!
As for me, I'll probably wait until July to order or until Gen Con. I've got no time between now and mid-July to even look at the book. I'm still looking through Inner Sea World Guide (which I like).
-Swiftbrook
I've got no problem with the amazon delay:
- It increases the chance of a later printing, with lots of the simple errors fixed.
- It is low enough that I can afford to get the pdf also, I'd have to choose one or the other if it was set up different. And that would mean less money to paizo, because I'd choose the pdf... Which I don't like.
either way I pay a price, if the price is waiting a little longer, I can live. I've got the pfd.
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Chief Technical Officer
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I've got no problem with the amazon delay:
- It increases the chance of a later printing, with lots of the simple errors fixed.
- It is low enough that I can afford to get the pdf also, I'd have to choose one or the other if it was set up different. And that would mean less money to paizo, because I'd choose the pdf... Which I don't like.
either way I pay a price, if the price is waiting a little longer, I can live. I've got the pfd.
Ultimate Magic just started shipping—it won't be needing a reprint anywhere *near* that quickly.
Ultimate Magic just started shipping—it won't be needing a reprint anywhere *near* that quickly.I've got no problem with the amazon delay:
- It increases the chance of a later printing, with lots of the simple errors fixed.
- It is low enough that I can afford to get the pdf also, I'd have to choose one or the other if it was set up different. And that would mean less money to paizo, because I'd choose the pdf... Which I don't like.
either way I pay a price, if the price is waiting a little longer, I can live. I've got the pfd.
oddly this saddens me, not that I care about what printing I get. I just like it when you guys sell out, and amazon has to wait to get it's printings. It makes me happy to see good work succeed.
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Chief Technical Officer
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Ultimate Magic just started shipping—it won't be needing a reprint anywhere *near* that quickly.oddly this saddens me, not that I care about what printing I get. I just like it when you guys sell out, and amazon has to wait to get it's printings. It makes me happy to see good work succeed.
Selling out quickly is actually kind of a *bad* thing. Print costs are driven by volume: the more you print, the cheaper each copy is (to a certain point). So when we go back immediately for a reprint, that means we printed way too few copies the first time—and therefore we paid more per copy than we could have, and we made less profit on those copies than we could have.
On the other hand, we don't want to print so many copies that they hang around in the warehouse for years and years, or—even worse—we don't recover the cost it took to print all those copies. We want to find a happy middle ground.
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I'm also in the bookindustry, and can relate to what you're writing DeathQuaker.
That being said. At one point you as customer (talking about the OP here) should have learned your lesson. Especially if this happens time and again.
I order alot of books from Amazon, but everything I need (or want) to get in a hurry I usually don't. Unless they have it in stock.
For instance, I buy all my PF stuff right here. Sure it is more expencive, but I know they ship it as soon as they can, and most likely sooner then anywhere else.
I know delayed orders are annoying, but with Amazon, unless they have the product in stock, you kinda have to expect it. That's the price you pay for those low prices :)
Ehh, the book was so cheap on Amazon I bought the PDF here to tide me over. I ended up paying a little less than I would have here for both versions. Honestly, that ends up being 2 sales for Paizo instead of one.
I can wait for the physical book as long as I have the PDF.
Posted in another thread:
Updated dates from Amazon on the copy I pre-ordered for a buddy:
We have received new release date information related to the order you placed on April 01 2011 (Order# XXX-XXXXXXX-XXXXXXX). The item(s) listed below will actually ship sooner than we originally expected based on the new release date:
Paizo Staff "Pathfinder Roleplaying Game: Ultimate Magic"
Previous estimated arrival date: July 14 2011
New estimated arrival date: June 09 2011
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Chief Technical Officer
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Sorry if this is slightly off the original topic but I have to ask this question. First off I'm guessing MSRP stands for something like manufacturers suggested retail price (In the UK we use RRP which stands for recommended retail price). So my question is do most FLGS actually charge that price in America?
Some provide discounts, but that's the expected price. Nobody charges *more* that that unless it has gone out-of-print and become a collectable.
I usually order from Amazon because overseas shipping costs are prohibitive for a single book.
When combining them with the subscription it gets a bit better but I have to wait a while, so I can wait a while on Amazon and save some money.
BUT, the inital price tag that Amazon displays is often not the one you have to pay, I have seen several cases of a substantial raise when the book finally becomes available (usually 30 days after it has been released).
Last I checked Amazon my copy of the Ultimate Magic book was due to be shipped July 7th. Checked today and it's shipped expected to arrive on the 2nd June.
Sorry if this is slightly off the original topic but I have to ask this question. First off I'm guessing MSRP stands for something like manufacturers suggested retail price (In the UK we use RRP which stands for recommended retail price). So my question is do most FLGS actually charge that price in America?Some provide discounts, but that's the expected price. Nobody charges *more* that that unless it has gone out-of-print and become a collectable.
...or unless you extend the term "America" to mean "North America". :-)
It just seemed from few posts that it was the norm for stores to charge the full price where as here almost all stores take 10-15% off the recommended price in order to compete with online sellers. There are exceptions obviously but they tend to be stores that are making their money on something else and just carry a small line of RPG books.
That's pretty much the case around here, as I've discovered (Oregon, southern Washington, etc.).
I've seen a couple of stores that have provided a 10% discount if they have to order it due to not stocking it, but that's not enough to entice me to WAIT to get the item. If they had it in stock AND discounted 10%, I'd likely buy more.
As such, I typically end up buying ancillary products from the FLGS, rather than the main stuff. :(