Chapter 292

In the afternoon, Asano Aiko and Satake Maki, who went to Nihon Publishing Distribution, also returned to the publisher and joined Akiwara Yuto and Nishijima Sōta.

However, the result was also disappointing. Regarding the 60,000 copies of the first edition, the department head at the Nihon Publishing Distribution headquarters stated that it was the same as before, only willing to order 7,000 copies.

Together with the 4,000 copies from Tokyo Distribution, it added up to only 11,000 copies.

Facing the frustration of Asano and Satake, Akiwara Yuto comforted them.

"It's okay, we can still help sell goods through the reading session, President Nishijima already has a lot of confidence here."

Nishijima Sōta was stunned, but quickly understood his intention to cheer them up and took the initiative to say: "Yes, I am preparing to contact local cooperative bookstores in Tokyo and find a high-end restaurant to hold a reading session."

After hearing these words, the expressions of Asano and Satake looked better.

Akiwara Yuto waved his hand and greeted everyone to walk into the third-floor conference room, preparing to hold a small meeting.

After everyone sat down, Asano Aiko recovered and looked at Nishijima Sōta: "President Nishijima, I want to ask, Tokyo Distribution and Nihon Distribution companies contracted at least 2 million copies out of the 3 million copies ordered in the first half of the year.

So we have great common interests, so can we use this reason to find their vice president or higher-level management who have relationships with them?"

In Asano Aiko's view, if the department head below cannot decide, then it is better to take the upper-level route; after all, the figure of 2 million copies involves a transaction amount of nearly 6 billion.

Even if it is allocated to each company, it is about 3 billion, which cannot be a small number.

After Nishijima Sōta heard this, he shook his head: "Miss Asano, do you know what the estimated sales volume of the Nihon publishing market was in the first half of the year?"

Seeing Asano Aiko couldn't answer, he continued: "Although the economy is in a downturn, the sales volume of the publication market in the first half of this year is still about 720 billion, and Tokyo Distribution and Nihon Distribution, because of the industry monopoly, occupy two-thirds of the total transaction volume.

So even if our publisher's sales volume in the first half of the year is very good, the proportion of performance occupying the business of these two companies is only about 2%."

Hearing these words, Asano Aiko was discouraged.

In the publication market, detective fiction is just a very small field; there are also manga, textbooks, traditional literature, biographies, reference books, magazines, and other miscellaneous things.

Wanting to make the other party pay attention just by cooperating with detective publications is undoubtedly a very difficult thing.

"President Nishijima, I want to ask, why did Tokyo Distribution and Nihon Distribution reduce orders?" Satake Maki asked suspiciously.

She didn't understand; after all, the cooperation between the two sides was very happy before, and this time it was too abrupt.

Nishijima Sōta hesitated and looked at Akiwara Yuto, not knowing whether to say it, while Akiwara Yuto said directly: "It's because Jingfan Society is targeting me."

He looked around at everyone and explained: "The main shareholders of Tokyo Distribution and Nihon Distribution are the four companies: Kejiaoguan, Mantanshe, Jingfan Society, and Dongyingshe, and Jingfan Society is the third and fourth largest shareholder of these two companies."

Except for Nishijima Sōta who already knew, Asano Aiko and Satake Maki immediately understood.

Under the request of the major shareholders, book trading companies like Tokyo Distribution can lose part of their economic interests to execute some unreasonable requirements.

And even if there is no cooperation with Akiwara Yuto's works, maybe the market gap left behind will be filled by Jingfan Society.

But now it's troublesome, what should be done to break the situation?

The two couldn't help but frown.

Akiwara Yuto clapped his hands, and after attracting everyone's attention, he said the decision he made yesterday.

"I have a plan to establish our own bookstore chain brand."

After hearing this sentence, Nishijima Sōta and others were stunned, doubting if they had heard it wrong.

Tsutaya Bookstore, or the original Anjiu Bookstore, although it has a bookstore under its banner, it is essentially just to display samples for distributors and other bookstores, and secondly, it can serve as a warehouse.

And even if a dozen or twenty chain bookstores are established, it will be of no avail for the current channel dilemma.

You must know that Tokyo Distribution and Nihon Distribution, these two, easily correspond to tens of thousands of bookstores.

"Teacher Akiwara, this cost is too great, and it's too late in terms of time!"

Nishijima Sōta immediately opposed: "What we need now is channels. So I personally suggest visiting some small distributors and strengthening visits to bookstores in various places to move them with sincerity."

Asano Aiko and Satake Maki didn't speak, but the expressions on their faces were very agreeable to this point.

Akiwara Yuto was not angry because he was refuted, but asked back: "What if the cost of my chain bookstore plan is very low, and it can build our own sales channel to help book sales?"

"This?" Nishijima Sōta fell into hesitation, and Asano and Satake also became a bit puzzled.

Akiwara Yuto smiled and then continued to describe his thoughts.

This time, he planned to use the BOOKOFF bookstore model.

BOOKOFF is Nihon's largest second-hand bookstore chain. From its opening in 1990 to 2005, it had 701 stores across Japan in just 15 years.

And the reason for rapid expansion is also because only 20% are directly operated stores, and the other 80% are franchises. With franchise fees, the cost of opening new stores naturally came down.

Besides that, its success also has great historical significance.

Because of the economic recession in the 90s, consumer purchasing power declined, so they preferred cheaper books. Although this is the case, consumers also attach great importance to the external image of books.

Therefore, BOOKOFF's "second-hand refurbished books" successfully occupied the market and remained dominant in the situation of the overall decline of the publishing industry.

Asano Aiko asked: "Akiwara, but aren't yours second-hand books? We are publishing new books."

Akiwara Yuto replied: "We can issue high-priced hardcover editions separately on the basis of the current paperback editions. These hardcover editions can be made to look old and sold in second-hand bookstores, and the price can be adjusted to be slightly lower than the paperback editions."

Asano Aiko was convinced, so she didn't speak, while Nishijima Sōta felt it deviated a bit from the original intention and asked: "Teacher Akiwara, how does this model establish channels?"

Akiwara Yuto nodded and continued to describe.

"For us, the most important points for book channels are two: one is that other bookstores pay attention and order goods, and the second is warehousing and logistics costs.

If a store of ours is established in the main urban areas of Nihon, then we can increase the storage proportion of books under the publisher through the store's warehouse.

In this way, if bookstores in other cities order from us, we can ship directly from the store's warehouse."

He hadn't mentioned one point yet, which is to build his own online sales platform, directly allowing bookstore owners to place orders on the website and ship.

However, many bookstore owners in this era are uncles and aunts, so he didn't expect them to use the Internet, so he decided to use telephone ordering as the main method first.

Nishijima Sōta pondered after hearing this.

The Nihon archipelago has a total of 47 first-level administrative regions, divided into 1 metropolis, 1 circuit, 2 prefectures, and 43 counties.

If points can really be laid out in these administrative regions, maybe it is really possible to achieve the effect Akiwara Yuto said.

However, is it really feasible?

Although Akiwara Yuto spoke clearly and logically, he was still a bit suspicious in his heart...

Akiwara Yuto looked at his expression, guessed his suspicion, and said: "How about this, President Nishijima, you help me make a statistic on bookstores to evaluate..."