How will the IngramSpark discount change affect you?
What is the IngramSpark minimum wholesale discount?
IngramSpark is a wholesale distributor. This means that they on sell your books to retailers who then sell them to customers. IngramSpark do not sell direct to book buyers. IngramSpark is important for indie authors, especially children's authors as they are the best POD option to sell hardback picture books on Amazon. Many authors use them in conjunction with KDP. This tactic is even recommended by IngramSpark.
When you set up your book in IngamSpark, you set a wholesale discount. This is the amount that Ingram takes off the retail price for the retailer.
This is best explained by an example:
| Book Retail Price | $10 |
| Book Printing Cost | $5 |
| Wholesale discount | 40% |
| Book store buys book for | $6 |
| Book store sells book for | $10 |
| Profit to store | $10 - $6 = $4 |
| Profit to author | $6 - $5 = $1 |
Now its not that straightforward as there are little fees along the way, but it gives you an idea.
The minimum discount is the minimum you can set in your IngramSpark account. This varies for different markets. IngramSpark will always encourage you to set the discount to the standard 55%, but that will make it very difficult to make any profit at all on your book sales through IngramSpark.
What has changed for the IngramSpark minimum wholesale discount?
Previously the minimum wholesale discount for the USA was 30%. This was great as it meant any sales via Ingram for Amazon made more money per book than KDP sales through Amazon.
In the example above, the author would have made $2 per book instead of $1.
IngramSpark has now increased the minimum to 40%. Bringing it in line with KDP print books. This is okay and not the disaster that many are saying it is. Essentially a little less money in our pockets. Not great, but not the end of the world.
What does this mean for my books?
If you have books currently set to a 30% discount in the US with IngramSpark, you will need to update your discount to 40% before the 30 October 2023. If you don't your books will be removed from US distribution. This means for example, that any books you sell on Amazon that come from IngramSpark (not KDP) will be removed from sale. It is quite important.
Need help with IngramSpark?
If you get stuck trying to do this, please do contact us and we can help you. We work with IngramSpark for all our books and the vast majority of our client's books, so we are very comfortable in their systems. And while we are not taking on new client books for a couple of months we can definitely start a conversation in the meanwhile - so do reach out via the contact form and let's chat about your book.
