On the evening of May 21st, Wei Chao, a sales employee of JD.com, publicly responded to the boycott of JD.com's 618 book promotion by multiple publishing houses on his social media.
The staff member said, "These days, many publishers have sent me letters saying they want to boycott JD 618's book promotion activities, with a very serious tone. I really feel that I am not easy. I just want to sell cheaper books and better benefit consumers; I just want to expand sales through small profits and high sales to create profits for our partners; I just want to do my best to promote consumption and create value for society... Why are I so angry? What did I do wrong?"
Two previous "joint statement notification letters" issued by the publishing industry were circulated on the Internet. Two notification letters were issued by 8 publishing houses in Beijing and the Shanghai Publishing Management Association on behalf of 46 publishing units in Shanghai, declaring that they will not participate in the 618 promotion plan proposed by Jiangsu Yuanzhou E-commerce Co., Ltd. (an affiliated company of JD.com).
Regarding this matter, JD Group has not yet responded to the Beijing News Shell Finance and Economics reporter.
As early as May 20th, several publishing industry leaders, including those from Beijing and Chongqing, told the New Beijing News and Shell Finance reporter that JD.com has requested a 30% discount on 618 price preservation products (30% off the listed price) this year and has notified the heads of various publishing houses by phone, attempting to leave no written records. "There has been a great response within the publishing industry to this matter.".
"This is very exaggerated. The cost price of books is only 20% to 30% off the list price. Normally, we cannot give this discount to internet celebrity influencers." The person in charge also stated that the overall profit margin of the industry has reached an extremely low level.
Several merchants have told the New Beijing News and Shell Finance reporter that the 618 shopping festival has experienced a series of changes in rules, reduced profit margins, and no pre-sale space. Overall, platforms returning to the main e-commerce business have chosen low prices as their core.
Price, as one of the most direct and easily accessible factors to consumers in the retail industry, plays a crucial role in consumer purchasing behavior.
But some platform owners have also told reporters from New Beijing News and Shell Finance that "for publishers, they can actually recoup costs before the new book is released. It is baseless to say that the platform is disrupting market order, and the original intention of the platform is to sell cheap books.".