How Bookshop.org is looking to cut into Amazon’s e-books dominance

Bookshop.org is taking another swing at Amazon’s dominance by launching its own e-book platform. While it won’t be compatible with Kindle right away, the company is hoping its profit-sharing model with local bookstores will help lure customers away from the world’s largest operation.
On Tuesday, Bookshop.org announced it would begin selling e-books via its website or independent bookstores that use its API. Customers can read the books in a browser, on the Bookshop.org app or on iPhone and Android devices. Bookshop.org donates a portion of its sales to more than 2,200 local bookshops, which can add e-book sales to their own websites and keep 100% of the proceeds.
Andy Hunter, founder and CEO of Bookshop.org, said the company has wanted to launch an e-books operation since its inception. In fact, it’s far and away the biggest customer request, to the point it’s become a gag with the company’s social media followers; On Halloween, the post read, “A haunted house but it’s just people asking me “Ebooks when!?!?!?!?!?!” over and over again”.
“This is just another tool in our effort to keep independent bookstores alive,” Hunter said. “But I think it’ll be a very effective one.”
Early returns were promising. By midday, Tuesday, Bookshop.org’s app was the #7 free book app on Apple’s App Store. The company said it was on track to sell over $30,000 in e-books on its first day and also netted about 2,000 new customers.
E-books are a decent chunk of the publishing industry, comprising about 9% of all books sold in November 2024. Revenues were up 2.9% year over year for a total of $945.1 million, according to the latest data from the American Association of Publishers.
Beyond the product itself, the launch represents another iteration of the anti-Amazon ethos that’s been a cornerstone of Bookshop.org’s marketing strategy. Its social media tagline, for example, is “A place to buy books online where every purchase supports local bookstores, not a billionaire.” The company has billed itself as a way for customers to use their purchasing power to support locally owned businesses while still having the convenience of shopping a large catalog online. Its social media posts frequently reference Amazon, while larger marketing strategies play off tentpole events like Prime Day.
The five-year-old platform raised $2.3 million in 2023 to kickstart its digital books operations, Hunter said. While a small sum compared to the size of the industry, Hunter said Bookshop.org was able to create a small team of engineers to develop the product, including a veteran of the New York Public Library’s digital team. “When you find the right people, you can get a lot done with a tiny team,” he said.
Hunter aims to get ebooks to be 5% of Bookshop.org’s revenue within a year and is shooting to capture at least 5% of the U.S. e-book market by 2029. “[For the] customers who love independent bookstores, when we buy e-books, we should be able to buy them from our local bookstore,” he said. “We shouldn’t be forced to go to Amazon to buy those.”
But capturing those customers means beating out Amazon, which Hunter said has about 80% of the market share for e-books.
Dave Marcotte, svp at Kantar, said Bookshop.org’s mission-driven approach may translate into sales because while many U.S. consumers use Amazon, they aren’t necessarily loyal to it if there are other options.
“There are things they do that are user-friendly, like how returns are excellent with Amazon,” he said. “But once you get past the functional level of a relationship, there’s no love. Anybody competing with them, if they can leverage an emotional stake, more power to them.”
While Amazon dominates with Kindle, shoppers do have other options. Rakuten’s Kobo has about 10% of the market and sells e-books from independent bookstores. Barnes and Noble’s Nook also has the benefit of allowing people to read books for free for limited periods of time or while connected to a store’s WiFi.
At present, e-books purchased from Bookshop.org can’t be transferred to an outside e-reader. Marcotte said this could prevent consumers from switching where they make their purchases. “My feeling is the books you read on your smartphone don’t get finished,” he said. “There’s kind of a disconnect, no matter how good the book is.”
Still, Hunter is betting that book readers are savvy enough to direct their purchases to local bookstores and figure out a reading setup that works for them. The platform is also introducing a social component: Users will be able to share a snippet of what they’re reading on social media with a link for their followers to check out what they’re reading or buy the book themselves.
Looking ahead, Hunter said Bookshop.org wants to integrate its sales into Kindle, but it will depend upon cooperation from Amazon. While that sounds lofty, Hunter believes it would be anti-competitive if the integration wasn’t allowed.
“I’m not interested in putting, like, 10 million pieces of hardware in a landfill somewhere. And people like their Kindles,” he said. “But they can start supporting independent bookstores with their purchases.”