Dear Mr. Bezos,
the following may sound harsh but on the other hand we Germans are famed for being blunt and direct.
I have a small blog on the internet which barely anyone reads but whenever someone unreasonably attacked Amazon Germany in the past I was there to defend it.
Because I really do like your service and your prices. I’ve been shopping at Amazon.de, .co.uk, .com, .ca for ages and one time even on .co.jp (to get the Japanese version of Kill Bill).
As you may know the German press really hates Amazon (not as much as Google, but almost) and I said I defended you.
But now you’re waging war on MY back. You want a bigger share of the profits of the German book publishers? Fine. Price negotiations are part of every business and they can be rough.
But deliberately delaying deliveries of the books from these publishers to pressure them? Now you’re betraying your most holy principle: That the customer’s satisfaction comes first.
And yes, German readers know that it’s not the publishers’ fault that their books are only shippable after 6 to 10 days, the newspapers made sure of that (see above).
And if I want to read Tom Clancy, then I want to read Tom Clancy, it is no help to me that Stephenie Meyer is available right now.
So yesterday I was in this local bookstore and I browsed for a while and found a new Manga comic that seemed interesting. I bought volume 1 right then and there.
Today I read and and wanted to read further. So I naturally went to Amazon. Until “will be shipped in 6 to 10 days”. You know what? I don’t need Amazon for that.
In 6 to 10 days I’ve been in the city twice and could by the sequel volumes in the same bookstore I bought the first one.
As Oliver Queen as Green Arrow would say: “You have failed this customer”.