BusinessTN

For many aspiring authors who want to publish but doubt they'll achieve bestseller status, "print on demand" (POD) publishing is an attractive option. With POD technology, writers needn't tie up money in inventory because a POD publisher can print and ship just those copies of a book that have already been sold.

The nation's leader in on-demand printing can be found right here in Tennessee. Headquartered in La Vergne, Lightning Source is a sister company to Ingram Book Group, the self-proclaimed "world's largest wholesale distributor of book product." Both companies are subsidiaries of Ingram Industries, that multi-billion-dollar umbrella corporation chaired by Martha Rivers Ingram.

Lightning Source has printed more than 50 million copies and more than 500,000 titles. These books, along with those printed by the thousands of other POD publishers across the nation, can't be sold in traditional stores, so online transactions are crucial to their success. But now, one of the most prominent online booksellers, Amazon.com, is refusing to sell their books.

In March, Amazon announced that, henceforth, it would sell directly only those POD books printed by BookSurge, the POD printer Amazon purchased in 2005. Other print-on-demand books must use Amazon's Marketplace, so they will no longer qualify for free shipping or one-click purchasing. In addition, Amazon is threatening those publishers who balk at using BookSurge with removal of the "buy now" button, which informs buyers that an item is in stock and will ship very quickly. At present, most POD books carry this option because on-demand printing is such a speedy process that books can be printed and shipped within two days.

Amazon claims the new policy exists solely to expedite shipping and improve the consumer experience. But Angela Hoy, co-owner of BookLocker.com, a POD publisher and online bookseller located in Bangor, Maine, says this explanation for the new policy just doesn't hold up. "Our printer, Lightning Source, already drop-ships POD books directly to Amazon's customers," Hoy says. "They even use an Amazon.com return address label."

Hoy's company originally used BookSurge for all its printing -- until driven away by what Hoy describes as BookSurge's poor production quality. Outraged that Amazon's new policy would require the small company to return to BookSurge, BookLocker has chosen instead to file a class-action lawsuit against Amazon.

BookLocker claims Amazon's actions violate the Sherman Antitrust Act. Hoy maintains that Amazon's dealings also disregard a preexisting contract with Lightning Source. "Amazon went over Lightning's head and contacted Lightning Source customers directly, telling them they must pay Amazon to print their books or risk having their buy buttons removed from the Amazon.com Web site," Hoy says.

When asked about the lawsuit, Lightning Source and Ingram representatives chose not to comment. Aside from a public statement released several months ago in which John Ingram promised that Lightning Source would strive to "continue to be the compelling choice as publishers make their outsourcing decisions," Ingram Industries has seemed strangely passive in regard to the whole affair. This corporate giant seems more than willing to let little BookLocker do all the fighting -- and Angela Hoy is ready to do it. She urges readers of her online magazine Writer's Weekly to boycott Amazon in favor of other online retailers. "We are confident [Amazon's] actions could very well put some POD publishers out of business," says Hoy. "The only winner in this entire scenario is Amazon."