France rules retail giant Amazon must charge more for book deliveries

In a move aimed at helping traditional bookstores survive tough online competition, France has passed a law forcing retailer Amazon and other e-commerce sites to charge more for deliveries of books.

France says Amazon must charge more for book deliveries. Ronny Hartmann AFP/File

Amazon has been charging the legal minimum of one euro cent for book deliveries, leaving French publishers and stores unable to compete.

Those in favour of the new rules say Amazon is pursuing "a predatory business model" that had to be curbed.

From now on book deliveries "cannot be offered free of charge" but must carry a "minimum charge" – the level of which will be set by the French government – the law stipulates.

Culture Minister Roselyne Bachelot said the law, which was backed by the National Assembly in October before winning unanimous Senate approval this Thursday, will "promote fairness" in the book trade.

Merci aux parlementaires pour le travail de qualité et l’adoption définitive, à l’unanimité, des propositions de loi de @LDarcos et @Sy_robert qui renforceront l’accès au livre et la lecture pour tous, déclarée grande cause nationale par @EmmanuelMacron ! pic.twitter.com/KvUEXWdndY

— Roselyne Bachelot (@R_Bachelot) December 16, 2021

Bookshops suffering

Amazon, which had been lobbying against the law, said the new measures would cut the purchasing power of French consumers by an annual €250 million as delivery charges rise.

A spokesman said that 40 percent of Amazon's book deliveries went to French areas with no bookshops which he said was the case for "90 percent of French municipalities".

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France has 3,300 independent book shops, more than most other European countries, but the bricks-and-mortar outlets suffered during Covid lockdowns that kept customers away even as the online book market flourished.

A fixed price system for books, in force since 1981, protects them from discounting by online competitors.

Banned from cutting book prices directly, internet giants like Amazon instead made home deliveries practically free, a strategy the traditional outlets with already dwindling margins were unable to match.