Some Indications of Rising Kindle Store Prices and Tentative Willingness Among Kindle Owners to Pay More Than $9.99 for New Releases

A little over two weeks ago, on February 25, I shared a post here with a breakdown of Kindle Store books by price range. The breakdown of the 447,000 titles in the Kindle Store at the time was as follows, as of February 25, 2010:

  • 19,795 Kindle Books Priced "Free" (4.42%) 
  • 3,023 Titles Priced from a Penny to 98 Cents (0.67%) 
  • 36,370 Kindle Books Priced at 99 Cents (8.12%) 
  • 62,275 Kindle Books Priced from $1 to $2.99 (13.9%) 
  • 87,722 Kindle Books Priced from $3 to $4.99 (19.58%) 
  • 81,230 Titles Priced from $5 to $9.98 (18.13%) 
  • 55,269 Titles Priced at $9.99 (12.34%) 
  • 5,139 Titles Priced from $10 to $12.99 (1.15%) 
  • 9,331 Titles Priced from $13 to $14.99 (2.08%) 
  • 87,771 Titles Priced at $15 and Up (19.59%)

Since then, as we approach the advent of the so-called agency model by which some of the major publishers intend to mandate (rather than "suggest") retail ebook prices to Amazon and other ebook retailers, we are beginning to see some small trends of change. There have been no real signs of change under the $9.99 price point, other than a decrease in the number of titles priced between a penny and 98 cents, which is probably a result of Amazon exercising some quality control over pubic domain titles and pushing small publishers toward the Kindle Digital Text Platform and away from MobiPocket as a publishing platform. Here's the first part of the breakdown of the 463,000 ebooks in the Kindle Store as of today, March 10, 2010:

But the percentage of books listed at $9.99 has slipped from 12.34% to 11.59%, and the percentage of books listed between $10 and $14.99 has increased from 3.23% to 4.21%. Nothing huge, but probably a significant trend in this balance of the breakdown as of today, March 10, 2010:
There may also be the beginning of a trend if change in the composition of the Kindle Store top 100 list. As of today, we see the following breakdown of the top 100 bestselling ebooks in the Kindle Store:
  • 50 priced at $0.00 
  • 1 priced from $0.01 to $0.98
  • 0 priced at $0.99
  • 1 priced from $1 to $2.99
  • 10 priced from $3 to $4.99
  • 15 priced from $5 to $9.98
  • 18 priced at $9.99
  • 2 priced from $10 to $12.99
  • 2 priced from $13 to $14.99
  • 1 priced at $15 and up
Although the number of free titles in the top 100 has declined from late December and early January, this seems less a matter of changed behavior than the clearly observable pattern that shows a higher preponderance of free books among the bestsellers in periods immediately following a high-volume shipping period for new Kindles, as we witnessed with the 2009 holiday season.

The more significant pattern may be the fact that there are 5 titles priced between $12.61 and $15.37 in the top 100. Although we have reported in the past on our survey results that show strong resistance among Kindle owners to paying more than $9.99 for new release bestsellers, there are growing indications that this resistance is far from absolute. Regardless of my own editorial views here, I will continue to report objectively on what is actually happening in the ebook price wars. I don't have enough in the way of past datapoints to conclude too much here, but this does look to me like the beginning of a trend. 

Stay tuned.

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