Canadian Booksellers Association doesn't want Amazon

In reaction to the news that Amazon is seeking government approval to expand operations in Canada by setting up its own warehousing and dispatch, instead of using a Canada Post subsidiary as it does now, the Canadian Booksellers Association released a statement demanding that the government reject the online retailer’s application. From the press release:

"CBA contends that allowing Amazon to operate a business within Canada would contravene the Investment Canada Act which requires that foreign investments in the book publishing and distribution sector be compatible with national cultural policies and be of net benefit to Canada and the Canadian-controlled sector.

"CBA President Stephen Cribar argues that Amazon’s entry into Canada would detrimentally affect the country’s independent businesses and cultural industries: 'Individual Canadian booksellers have traditionally played a key role in ensuring the promotion of Canadian authors and Canadian culture. These are values that no American dot.com retailer could ever purport to understand or promote.'

"CBA urges the Canadian government and the Department of Canadian Heritage to continue its support of our unique cultural perspective by placing reasonable limits on American domination of our book market and rejecting Amazon.com’s current application."

There isn't much to be surprised about this, the equivalent body in NZ would say the same thing. But isn't it simply an anti-competitive attitude? We can't comment about whether or not "Canadian booksellers have traditionally played a key role in ensuring the promotion of Canadian authors and Canadian culture", but that certainly can't be said about booksellers in NZ (see our post from 24 June last year).

One thing that we have noticed is that a large number of our own mainly older customers don't shop online either because they don't trust the internet or they just don't like using computers. These people shop the traditional way - from paper catalogues or by going down to their local bookshops. If they are looking for the types of books we specialise in, of course, they won't find them at their local bookstore (with a few notable exceptions), and they are just as unlikely to find people in those shops who have any knowledge of or interest in books. There is thus plenty of scope for the dedicated, knowledgeable, specialised independent bookseller in NZ and we daresay in Canada too. The only booksellers who need fear Amazon are those who don't meet this description.