Club Guides cheaper from EBay and Amazon
The Club publishes three Touring Guides (for France, Spain/Portugal and the rest of western Europe) and offers a reduced price on each for Members - but there is a delivery charge of £2.50 added, even if you order only one book.
I checked the prices on EBay and Amazon for the same books and found offers (available for anyone) which were a lot cheaper. For example I would have paid £7.65 plus £2.50 delivery for the Spain & Portugal Guide from the Club (totalling £10.15) compared to £6.11 (with free postage) on Ebay, which is almost 40% less!
Comments
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I see the seller is Wordery. I’ve bought items direct from them before and found them fast, efficient and postage free.
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Does the Club usually respond to this sort of revelation - or do they keep their heads down, hoping Members won't make an issue of it?
On the face of it selling Club publications to booksellers so cheaply that they can afford to sell on to the public for 40% less than the Club's members price (and still make a worthwhile profit) is a bit odd.
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First and foremost this is a discussion area for help and information. You can alert admin to a particular topic by using the report button which might bring a response. I suspect it depends on whether the Club have any control over the general resale price of the guides which they won't. I imagine the Club price the guides not only to cover the costs of production but also to make a reasonable profit, which of course gets ploughed back into member facilities. If others decide to make hardly any profit out of the sale of these books by discounting them what can can the Club do. At the end of the day if it becomes uneconomic to produce these guides who loses out? Not EBay or Amazon but members of the Club so be a bit careful for what you wish for.
David
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The unit cost of production of a book certainly depends on the print run volume, but I don't think anything forces the Club to supply these books wholesale to booksellers if it prefers to sell only directly to the retail (and membership) market itself - and the club should have a pretty good idea by now of how many of each edition of these books it can sell.
The bookseller who is selling them so cheaply on EBay and Amazon must still be making a worthwhile profit so it's difficult to imaging that their buying price is much more than £3 per copy. The printing cost is likely to be at least £2 for this sort of book per copy, even for a long print run.
Has my previous post been removed by Admin; I didn't try to delete it? I suppose I might have clicked on "delete" by mistake.
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I bought one of the Touring Spain & Portugal guides from Amazon for the same amount and it arrived next day.
The Guide itself was a bit of a disappointment; more of a booklet than a proper book, less than 7mm thick! The Portugese sites are listed on a total of only 20 pages with four to eight sites on each page, depending on how many advertisments are also displayed. The editor has clearly only attempted to include sites suitable for caravans and a couple of "Motorhome Park" sites where we have stayed (excellent sites but caravans are not allowed) are not mentioned. This guide needs a serious overhaul to cater properly for motorhomes.
At the listed price (before delivery charges) of £8.50, I think this guide is a rip off.
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Fair points.
And one reason Amazon and its relation Wordery, with their "free postage" are so cheap is the conditions they impose on their couriers, typically of the order of 40p payment per successful delivery (i.e. nothing for failed attempts) and serious penalties for failing to keep to schedule, to be ill, or otherwise unable to attend.
Amazon's delivery depots also impose swingeing conditions on workers.
So of course' it's going to be cheaper than the club's own sending.
If you're interested, watch Ken Loach's film "Sorry we Missed You."1 -
hope you are not too disappointed with your purchase, mine arrived today and I am not overly impressed, a lot of site listings particularly for Spain, and the book is nice and compact for stowage in car/van but overall i dont think it is worth the money " once bitten, twice shy"
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oh well, should het mine mid December.
