Comments south end press has made

  • Taking the book as an example

    Since many of the comments are using buying books as their case study and we are a publisher (South End Press) I started thinking about the different paths from us to you and the impacts of that path.

    I'm a bit of a book geek so I thought other people might be interested. Here are the usual paths our books take.

    I think this is pretty accurate for most publishers (well except for me biking books to the LPC). So I guess in conclusion, like most hings, the lower you buy on the food chain the lower your impact. Another thing to consider is your shipping method. The more expedited your shipment the more airplanes involved.

    A. Shortest path--lowest impact

    1. Books ship from the printer (union printer in Quebec, Canada) to our office in Cambridge, MA
    2. I put some books in my bag and ride to the bookstore where I volunteer
    3. You take the T to the store for an event and buy some books

    B. Pretty short path
    1. Books ship to office as in A
    2. You order from our website or by mail
    3. We mail the book to you

    C. The independent bookstore path
    1. Books ship to our distributor warehouse in TN
    2. Books shipped to bookstore
    3. You bike to the store to get your book
    (fine print: sometimes there is another wholesaler between the distributor and the store)

    D. The online bookseller path

    1. Books ship to distributor
    2. Books shipped to online bookseller warehouse
    3. Books shipped to you
    (fine print: as in C)

    E. The chain bookseller

    1. Books ship to distributor
    2. Books shipped to bookstore warehouse
    3. Books shipped to bookstore
    4. You go to the store and get the book

    --alexander--->
    On Umbra on online shopping posted 2 years, 6 months ago 22 Responses