Bookstores Can Add Their Names to ABA’s Letter to DOJ

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In an e-mail on Wednesday, July 22, the American Booksellers Association invited bookstore members to add their names to its July 13 letter to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ). Last week, in an unprecedented joint action, booksellers, authors, and literary agents called on the DOJ to investigate the business practices of Amazon.com.

In a letter delivered to the DOJ on July 13, the group Authors United called for an investigation of Amazon’s “abuse of its dominance in the world of books.” On the same day, a letter from ABA urged the department to give “careful consideration” to the appeal from Authors United. The Authors Guild and the Association of Authors’ Representatives also expressed their support of the Authors United action.

“Because we believe that this outreach to the DOJ is so important, ABA wants to give the largest number of independent bookstore members the opportunity to become co-signers of our letter,” ABA CEO Oren Teicher explained in Wednesday’s e-mail.

ABA member stores that wish to add their names as a signatory to the ABA letter should send an e-mail with their name, store name, city, and state to [email protected] before 5:00 p.m. on Friday, July 31.

In its letter to the DOJ, ABA said: “As with our author colleagues, we are concerned that the mega-book-retailer Amazon.com has achieved such considerable market power with such questionable business tactics that it is undermining the ecosystem of the entire book industry in a way that will be detrimental, especially to mid-list authors, new authors, and minority voices.” (Read the letter in full here.)