RISING COST OF BOOKS

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22507, 15 September 1938, Page 4

RISING COST OF BOOKS

PROBLEMS OF PUBLISHER AND SELLER DESIRE FOR REMOVAL OF PRIMAGE TAX The rising cost of producing books was referred to by Mr A. J. Coveney in an address to the Canterbury branch of the New Zealand Libraries’ “Every effort must be made to keep the retail price of books down,” he said. “I am pleased to note that your association has, together with the Associated Booksellers of New Zealand, made strong representations to the Minister for Customs to have the primage tax on books removed. “The problems of bookselling today are intimately connected with the ever-increasing problems of the publisher and his printer. Every bit of raw material used in the manufacture of books—paper, cardboard, cloth, and so on—has during the last few years shown a considerable increase in price. Wages in the various trades have also increased, and working hours have decreased. Many London printers with large staffs and extensive plants are losing work to printers in the provinces, who, by reason of lower overhead costs, can undercut their city competitors. “Many publishers are faced with the alternatives of increasing their published price or shortening their discounts to the trade,” he said, “Hardly a mail arrives that does not contain a notification from a publisher to that effect.” Though the Left and Right and other book clubs were doing useful work, they were naturally no use to the bookseller, who very often had the same books as those issued by the clubs on his shelves at four times the price. The publisher who allowed an important book to be circulated through a book club had to realise that he could not “eat his cake and have it, too.” The club became his principal channel of supply.