'The customer is always right', but are they when they're book collectors chasing unrealistic levels of perfection that ultimately doesn't exist (and which will always leave them unhappy)?
Running a small business can sometimes feel like the odds are stacked against right you from the very start.
Data shows that more than 50% of all new businesses fail within their first three years, with some 4% sunk in just their first year. Around 34% fall by the wayside by the end of only their second year trading.
For purely online businesses the failure rate is even higher – with one scary set of figures recently revealing 90% of all e-commerce (online only) businesses failing within the first 120 days of launch. Ouch!
So, I should probably count myself lucky that four years after launching, I’m still here (although to be fair, I do also have a ‘proper job’, and online book selling is more my second, side business).
The particular scourge affecting online businesses however, are the extremely high levels of ‘returns’ they experience – that is when people buy stuff they haven’t physically seen, get it, then realise the product didn't quite live up to what they were expecting (and want a refund).
Across all online retailers, return levels are an eye-watering 20%, with fashion being the worst – at around 26%. Yes, that’s more than a quarter of all sales having to be written off.
Returns don’t just cause disappointment all round; they create additional cost too, with time spent reimbursing customers, and having to restock items, or (in some cases), having to write that item off completely. It's no surprise some retailers now want to charge customers for making returns, in the hope it will create more considered purchasing to begin with.
Book selling and returns
Part of the reason I launched www.jamesbondfirsteditions.co.uk was because of my own disappointing buying experience – where minimally photographed books often gave a very one-sided view of their actual condition – a point of view that when I expectantly opened my purchases, I was often left unhappy, and also out of pocket.
I sought to want to break this mold by firstly only stocking the very best books anyway. That way quality could be guaranteed.
But I also vowed to always make sure I gave all my books – from £25 paperbacks to thousand-pound plus books – the full photographic treatment they deserved.
I know for a fact that you won’t find many other booksellers giving such a detailed photographic display of their wares.
The benefit of doing this (I feel), is many-fold.
For a start, because I know most buyers have been bitten before by lack-lustre descriptions, I’ve wanted to bring back some much-need trust between sellers and customers.
Generally, I’ve found people have been hugely grateful for this.
Having sold approaching 50 books from my site now, I’m pleased to say I’ve not had a single return – which I think comfortably beats the typical statistics.
I like to think I’ve developed a reputation for being honest in my descriptions. This has been borne out by not having a single person tell me their book is not how they expected it to be….
…until this week!
I bring you exhibit A: A ‘fine’ paperback (first impression) of For Your Eyes Only.
The buyer emailed me to say his book had arrived, but that it would “have to serve as a space filler as it has significant spine roll and lean to page block.”
Not only this, he said the book was “falling some way short of the very fine sets I’m putting together.”
The final kicker was this: “Perhaps a little more transparency with the negatives as well as the positives.”
I’m not going to name the buyer, and I know I’m breaking the cardinal rule that the ‘buyer is always right’ – but on this occasion I’m perplexed.
What do you think?
I wouldn’t normally air the content of private emails, but my initial response was shock, and then surprise, and then bemusement.
Had a really sold such a duff book?
Take a look at the pictures - above and below.
The main pictures above are just four of the 13 (yes 13), pictures that I assiduously took, uploaded and added to my store (see left), for what was a relatively cheap (£35) book.
Not only would most sellers not bother taking so many photos for such a low-price book, I don’t think anyone can be in too much doubt that I didn’t show the book from all conceivable angles.
So I was initially bemused to hear that the buyer didn’t think he got what he expected.
More than this though, having studied the pictures, I was also surprised that he was making the claims he was. I – for the life of me – can’t see any of the ‘significant spine roll and lean to page block’ that he references. Can you??
I’ve seen lots of paperbacks in my time, and this really was a beauty. Spine unbroken, almost unread. This is a 62 year old book. I can’t see how it could have been any newer looking than it was.
My judgement was that this was in fine condition.
The bigger question – are buyers seeking impossible perfection?
I’m all for buyers’ rights, and for them to receive exactly what they thought they would get. That’s www.jamesbondfirsteditions.co.uk's reason for existing.
But when a comment feels vexatious, or even untrue, or certainly unfair, I can’t help wondering one thing – are buyers seeking impossibly high levels of perfection?
If they are, it would seem that honest booksellers are almost doomed to failure before they even start.
If we’re getting to the point where even the most infinitesimal flaws (if they can even be called this), are being raised to justify some sort of recourse, I feel this is dangerous territory.
When a ‘complaint’ just didn’t feel valid, selling books just feels like too much trouble than its worth (I won’t be throwing in the towel by the way).
The root causes
An even bigger question, perhaps, is what the root cause of – let’s call them ‘unrealistic expectations’ might actually be.
I can only guess that perfection – perhaps impossible perfection – is being now sought because Ian Fleming collecting isn’t cheap, and so there is an enhanced desire to match price-paid with condition.
Of course, condition has always driven price, and one supposes that when you aim to sell the nicest books possible, you attract people who really do want items as fine as possible. That’s fine. It’s what my business is about.
But I still ask myself whether customers should try to expect a level of preservation and perfection that simply isn’t possible.
Moreover, if book collectors really are expecting a level of condition that is nigh-on impossible, where does this leave honest sellers just trying to do their bit?
Perceptions may vary, but time doesn’t stay still
I’ve previously blogged that when if comes to describing condition, the art of selling books can often by terribly subjective. One person’s ‘good’ is another’s ‘fine’. ‘Average’ means very little, ‘good’ is not much better.
In the past I’ve actually been very clear where I stand about describing a book’s condition – for me it’s all about how a book presents now – that is, in this very moment in time.
In fact, I’ve rallied against the use of phrases such as ‘for its age….’ because this excuses poor condition, and tries to minimalise the true and actual condition of a book.
But it’s for this precise reason that I take criticism (unwarranted in my view), somewhat personally.
Judging is... a judgement
Whist I will never excuse a book’s condition, I do think it is worth saying that as soon as a book is made, the likelihood of it saying exactly the same – and over more than half a century – is impossible.
I’ve seen brand new books that have ever-so minute imperfections, so expecting a 60-70 year book to look like it’s never been touched is – I feel – an expectation too far.
So yes, this might well mean that I’m partly apportioning a book being described as ‘fine’ as being ‘fine for being 70 years old‘.
But I think I can stand by this, because I think that generally speaking, most people do understand this.
My worry is when expectations veer off, and are simply not consistent with the way books naturally age (they are, after all, entirely paper-based objects).
If this happens I fear booksellers will start to see – dare I say it – ever more picky clientele – people who simply won’t ever be happy with even the best possible book that can be found.
The best I can do as a seller is show a ton of pictures, annotate them as best I feel I can, and give that to customers to look at and read, and make their own judgements.
If I’m wrong, I’ll be the first to hold my hands up.
But I go to lots of effort to show my books exactly as they are – there’s no colour correction, no fiddling to make it look straighter, or more tightly bound, or mark-free than it might really be.
My books are simply placed flat, stood up, front and back, and photographed exactly as they are (see left). What people see is what they'll get.
If people don’t like what they see, or they don’t think it looks good enough for them, I’m totally fine with that. It’s their choice, and I’ve armed them with what they need to make their decision.
But what I do urge, that if you are chasing absolute perfection, while you will get close to it on www.jamesbondfirsteditions.co.uk, perfection that isn’t possible is just chasing an idea that may not actually exist.
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