Early sunday morning, I woke up to an email from Paul Montgomery, sent to the whole iFanboy staff telling us about drastic discounts on Marvel Omnibus books at Amazon.com. It was surely a mistake, but there it was, apparently valid. I did what many did, and ordered 8 Omnibus editions immediately, for the low price of $8.74 each. Others were selling for $14.99. I didn't really think the order would be honored, but hey, what the heck. Maybe they're clearing out the warehouse?
In the meantime, the internets were ablaze with activity and chatter about the books. Notable were tweets from Marvel writer, Ed Brubaker, who said the following:
Nice to see the Criminal omnibus shoot up to #18 on Amazon, but I hope no one actually expects to get the books for 15 bucks.
That's less than Amazon paid for the book from the distributor.
Which means on a 50 dollar book, Amazon is losing 10 bucks a sale, at least. Still, I do hope they honor the sales even if it's a glitch.
At that point, I was sure that there was some sort of error going on. But I checked my order, and it was still there. Good to go. Ron even got a shipping confirmation that some of the books had been sent out.
Then, Tuesday morning, I received the following email from Amazon:
Hello,
Our records indicate you recently ordered 'Fantastic Four Omnibus, Vol. 1 (v. 1) The X-Men Omnibus, Vol. 1 Iron Man Omnibus, Vol. 1 Daredevil Omnibus, Vol. 1 The Death of Captain America Omnibus Daredevil by Brian Michael Bendis & Alex Maleev Omnibus, Vol. 2 Invincible Iron Man Omnibus, Vol. 1 The Ultimates Omnibus'. Unfortunately, due to a pricing error, we sold many more than expected. In fact, we completely sold out — we don't have any in stock right now, and we're not even sure if we'll be able to get more.
As a result, we've had to cancel your order. I realize this is disappointing news, and I'm so sorry for any inconvenience this causes.
You may want to check our website from time to time to see if this item is available. If anyone is selling it, you'll see a "More Buying Choices" box on the product detail page; if it's not available from any sellers, you might see an "Order it used" or "Alert me" link. "Order it used" allows you to place a pre-order for the item in case another seller lists the item for sale later. "Alert me" allows you to sign up so we can e-mail you when Amazon has stock available for purchase.
I'm sorry I don't have better news. We hope to see you again soon.
I thought, "OK, fair enough," but what bothered me was the idea that they said they sold out, and they didn't know when or if they were going to get more. Yet at the same time, many of the books were listed as In Stock on the site. I wasn't upset that I wasn't going to get a ton of books for what is essentially free, but I didn't like being told what was essentially an untrue excuse. I would have been fine with the fact that there was an error, and it would have been too costly to honor those orders. I get that. Also, the sign off was kind of funny.
Meanwhile, the complaints started up on the web from people who were all kinds of flummoxed over the injustice of it all. Some said that this was proof that the books were overpriced, and if Marvel just sold them for less, they'd make more money. But that's just patently untrue. Anyone who sells a product at an enormous loss will sell a lot of units, but it's not good business sense. Others thought that one misstep from Amazon meant they should make massive amends, and take the loss to the tune of what must have been a six figure glitch. Personally, I didn't feel entitled to anything. Those books are expensive to produce, and they're luxury items for people who really want to drop a lot of cash on them. It's not that Marvel is turning them out for $4 each, and selling them for $75. That's just not the case. Throw a $1,000 price tag on a $20,000 car, with an invoice of $19,000, and you'll sell a lot of cars, but you'll also go out of business.
I thought that was about all, but then Wednesday, I got the following unexpected email from Amazon:
Hello,
We wanted to follow up on a recent message we sent about the cancellation of your recent order.
To recap: Due to a pricing error, we sold many more graphic novels than expected. In fact, we completely sold out — we don't have any in stock right now, and we're not sure when we'll be able to get more.
We're sorry for any frustration the issue may have caused, and have applied a $25 promotional certificate to your account.
You can use it the next time you order an item shipped and sold by Amazon.com. You'll see your available promotional balance at checkout–this amount will be applied to your next order automatically without entering a claim code.
I hope this helps. We look forward to seeing you again soon.
Sincerely,
Customer Service Amazon.com
http://www.amazon.com/
It was a nice surprise, and one that I'll gladly accept, but not one that I necessarily feel I deserve. They didn't have to do this, but the fact that they did is certainly a mark on the plus side in my book. I order a lot of stuff from them (not Conor levels, mind you), and I would continue to do so.
Would it have been cool to get a giant stack of books for almost nothing? Absolutely. Did I have anywhere to put them or time to read them? No, not really. So, in the end, it's a wash.
What were your experiences? What did you order? Did you get anything? What did you get with the promotional certificate instead?
Me? I put it towards a Wii that I was going to buy anyway.
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Thanks for explaining this Josh because I had honestly no clue what people were complaining about.
I got the following books through the glitch, actually shipped to my door: The Walking Dead 1-4, The Ultimates Omnibus, Punisher MAX v. 3-5, Daredevil Omnibus (Bendis) v.2. Three other books remain in my orders but won’t ship for a while. I also purchased three other books at the Barnes and Nobles glitch, but who knows if that will actually ship or not.
I then purchased Batman Begins on blu-ray and Scott Westerfeld’s Leviathan with the $25 promotional offer.
Also, it’s looking like you can’t buy any Marvel books off Amazon…i don’t know what’s going on with that now.
also, there is this link i just found: http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/17028.html
Hey, I was wondering if this would be discussed. I ordered:
New Avengers Volume 1,
Civil War,
Invincible Iron Man Omnibus Volume 1,
Secret Wars Omnibus,
Invincible Ultimate Collection Volume 2,
Avengers Disassembled: Thor, Captain America and Iron Man,
Bone the one volume epic,
Only bone has been cancelled so far, and I got a $25 certificate which was weird, although does it show up in your balance? All of the others, except Secret wars have been shipped, although I’m unsure about my secret wars omnibus.
I agree. The deal seemed too good to be true and it was. but it was cool of them to give $25 credit . Ordered the Star man Omnibus with it
Barnes & Noble had similar deals yesterday; only their deals were legit. I picked-up many omnibi (Captain Britain, Dan Dare, Criminal Deluxe Edition, Daredevil Vol. 2, etc) for as low as $14 each. As soon as they sold out of one book in particular, they stopped selling. The whole sale lasted a few hours, and in the end I got some pretty sweet deals.
And with the $25 I got from Amazon for free? I put towards the PREACHER Deluxe Edition Volume 2 and paid the difference of $1.39. So yesterday was a pretty damn good day for me, and I saved litterally hundreds for paying attention to BleedingCool.
Wish iFanboy would have told me about this . . . ahahha
I didn’t order any of them for two reasons. One, I much rather have the softcover trades. I feel more comfortable reading and re-reading them, lending them out, and just not worried about keeping them in mint condition. I’m used to be one of THOSE guys who had billions of those white boxed full of bagged and boarded comics and I’ve only recently started ‘waiting for the trade.’ I just keep saying to myself, "I know they won’t be worth anything in the future. I should just enjoy and share them now!"
The second reason is that I knew that it was a mistake and I just didn’t feel comfortable taking advantage of Amazon. They were very good to me during the five years I was in Australia where I had no problem getting books and DVDs shipped to me where other vendors gave me lots of problems.
Of course I now kinda wish I did, because I would love to have gotten the $25 certificate. Oh well, I guess I got $25 worth of Karma.
My experience was exactly the same as yours, Josh. Sure, it would have been nice to have over three thousand pages worth of comics for $33, but I understand why it didn’t go through. With my free money, I just picked up a Wii game. I’m totally okay with how it all worked out.
I had a few ordered, my orders got cancelled. Sure I was excited and willing to exploit the glitch, but at the same time I thought it would be doubtful I’d get anything. The $25 credit wasn’t really needed, IMO, but it’s a really nice gesture that I was happy to get.
Interestingly the same thing happened on Barnes & Noble’s website (on a much smaller scale). Right now I have the Criminal collection, DD Bendis, Alan Moore Captain Britain, and Tomb of Dracula omnibi awaiting shipment for $11 a piece. No cancellation emails yet! Fingers crossed
I lucked out and 3 of the 6 books I ordered are being shipped at I type this, the rest were cancelled and I got my $25 credit.
Getting: Wolverine, Bendis’ Daredevil vol. 2 and Ultimates Omnibi
I’m amazed Amazon chose to honor as many orders as they could, and then gave credit to those it couldn’t. That’s above and beyond what anyone should have expected.
Ordered my loot on Sunday morning. It was all cancelled on Tuesday I believe. Used the $25 credit towards Mad Men season 3, which I honestly want more than any of those books. Good on Amazon for going above and beyond here.
Obviously, my experience was virtually identical to yours, right down to the part where I briefly went from "nobody owes me anything" to "hey! They’re lying to me, and it’s a dumb lie!" in the blink of an eye. I got over it in a hurry.
I "only" ordered two books, neither of which I will receive. It may be time to let that Howard the Duck dream die.
I almost got lured into the "we’d rule the world if these books weren’t ‘overpriced’" logic trap, but then I realized, yes, giving away $100 things for free would move a lot of $100 things. Something to keep in mind when Disney turns Marvel into a charitable organization. If lobster were three cents, I’d have it twice a day.
I ordered several things and 2 copies of the Criminal Deluxe Edition, one of which I planned to give to a friend (because I am that generous!). The first email I received from Amazon said "Sorry, it was a glitch, but we will honor the price listed and simply reduce the quantity from 2 to 1." I was still pretty stoked, though it didn’t address any of the other products. Even getting 1 thing for super cheap is pretty sweet. The next day I got the email Josh posted above telling me that everything was sold out. I was disappointed, but also chagrined that I felt they owed me cheep books based on a mistake. The $25 on my next order is fabulous and not at all necessary on Amazon’s part. I haven’t tried to use it yet, but did see that Conor tweeted it didn’t work for him. Any updates on that, Conor? Has it worked for other people?
Also, last night a similar thing happened with Barnes & Noble. I was able to order The Walking Dead Compendium, Daredevil Omibus (Bendis/Maleev) Vol. 2, and The Complete Essex County hardcover for $11 each. This time I paid extra for quick shipping, rather than the free option, which may have been the reason some people received their Amazon order. I have received an email from B&N saying the Walking Dead Compendiumhas shipped. We’ll see.
I only ordered Madman Gargantua and it’s still there, I did get my $25 coupon anyway though. Got Gotham Central Vol 2 and Complete Action Philosophers
I ended up ordering:
The X-Men Omnibus, Vol. 1
Iron Man Omnibus, Vol. 1
Secret Wars Omnibus
Wolverine Omnibus Vol. 1
Golden Age Marvel Comics Omnibus Volume 1
The Ultimates Omnibus’
Unfortunately, I didn’t get any of them. Bummed, but not incensed. Heard of many people agitating for some sort of recompense from Amazon (ie. the "call and yell at them with righteous indignation" strategy). Wasn’t going to go that route. Couple of days later, I was happy to get the $25 gift certificate…which I used (in conjunction with another $15 certificate I had kicking around) to buy Mass Effect 2 for my 360…for $5.99. Win!
I had no idea any of this was going on, and totally missed out. I’m a frequent Amazon user, and I’m glad to hear the news about the coupon.
I only ordered the Ultimates omnibus and I ordered when the news first broke. I got a shipping confirmation and it should arrive in the mail today or tomorrow. On top of that, I also got the $25 promotional credit. The total cost of my order (shipping included) was $20.14. So basically Amazon gave me an omnibus and $5. Had my order been canceled I would have been fine with it. It was a costly mistake Amazon made and many people exploited it (including myself). I consider myself lucky that I made out and honestly feel a lttle bad for expoliting the glitch.
I’m not a big Marvel fan, so I didn’t find much of interest, but I ordered Civil War and Old Man Logan for $14.99 each and received them both. I also ordered Ultimates Omnibus but they sold out and I got the $25 discount instead.
I ordered:
Nextwave Ultimate Collection
Secret Wars Omnibus
Secret Wars II Omnibus
Daredevil Omnibus (Brubaker)
Ultimates Omnibus
Wolverine Omnibus
Invincible Iron Man Omnibus
Madman Gargantua
Criminal Omnibus
Death of Captain America Omnibus
Invincible Ultimate Collection
Dark Avengers/X-Men: Utopia
Powers Vol. 2 Hardcover
Powers Vol. 3 Hardcover
I ended up getting Nextwave, Criminal, Powers Vol. 2, Powers Vol. 3, Utopia, and Daredevil Omnibus. Way beyond what I was expecting. Then with the $25 gift certificate, I got Green Lantern TPBs 2, 3, and 4 of the current run.
I haven’t been able to afford comics in years, so this has been an awesome experience.
When I was ordering from Amazon on Sunday I didnt even notice the low priced Omnibi, all I was there to order was Scalped Vol. 1 and Afrodisiac. They arrived on Wednesday ALONG with the email promising me the $25 dollar credit. Im not sure how I got on the email list, maybe because I have some of the books on my wishlist?
I wish I had put my order in late Saturday night when I first saw the glitch. At that point, everything was still listed as in stock and available to ship right away. But I knew it was a glitch and didn’t bother.
By the time Sunday morning came around and the news was everywhere I figured "why not?" and put an order in. At that point everything was listed as needing weeks or months to ship. Of course, my entire order was canceled.
The $25 credit was a totally smart move on Amazon’s part. I ended up using it for a bunch of Blu Rays and spent ay more than $25. Amazon ended up making more money off me in the end.
By the way, they have monthly $5 album sales. 500 albums. All in drm free MP3.
I tried to order the X-Men Omnibus and 2 ultimate editions of Alias. In retrospect, I should have sprung for express shipping and maybe I would have gotten them. Dunno. My order was canceled, and I now have $25 that I will probably use on ebooks or music downloads. And I ended up buying the 2nd Ultimate Alias (which was the one I really wanted) from my local comic store — figuring that the credit made me $25 ‘richer’ and I could throw some of that in the way of a deserving retailer.
I have to say that this is the 3rd time within a year that I’ve observed a vocal wave of Internet rage in response to something Amazon has done. Some of these may have been more justified than others, but if I was involved with that company, I’d be working on their PR strategies/quick response.
Caroline, I was thinking something along those lines the other day. "Lately, the only time I hear Amazon’s name is when they’ve perpetrated some ‘outrage.’" Oh, I remember! It was after they canceled the orders but before they sent out the coupons. I wondered whether they would do any kind of damage control, or whether they thought they were too big to worry about losing a couple of nerds anymore. I was pleasantly surprised.
My Old Man Logan got through. So that and a $25 credit was nice.
Their inventory of graphic novels is decimated.
I feel like so much of the Amazon rage is unfounded. I’ve had nothing but excellent experiences with them.
I also placed a large order on Sunday morning, not expecting anything to ship. My order was cancelled, and I did get the $25 credit, which is very generous.
Sounds like Amazon did the only logical thing here. The mistake never should have been made, but it was obviously an honest mistake. The $25 is obviously a PR move meant to appease those that felt slighted. Many companies wouldn’t have taken that step.
@josh – Enjoy the Wii. May I suggest New Super Mario Wii. It was a lot of fun.
@josh I tend to agree with you, and the first time one of these debacles happened I was very much on the ‘It’s unreasonable for people to expect them to respond with the same kind of speed that the Internet spreads outrage and unverified information. They couldn’t have anticipated this." But — if it keeps happening, at some point, maybe they need to hire somebody to be on top of Twitter. And to release statements as soon as they catch a problem.
I do think, in the end, they handled this pretty well — I mean, I have a $25 credit that I don’t really think I deserve, and I’m not going to stop spending my money there.
I ordered one book, Amazing Fantasy Omnibus at $14.99 and i got the "sorry" email a few days later. I didn’t get the gift certificate. I’m assuming because my order wasn’t over $25. Kinda pissed but Amazon has always given me great deals. Just today I found a Tegan and Sara album on vinyl for cheap. ordered. i love you amazon
I ordered 8 books from Amazon including: Death of Cap, Iron Man (Fraction), Daredevil (Bendis) vol 2, Daredevil (Brubaker) vol 1, Wolverine, X-Men, Hulk and Golden Age Marvel. I received the first three today and have not had any of mine cancelled, yet.
I ordered a bunch of books, although like most I was doubtful I’d actually see any of them. On the other hand, Amazon does have great deals a lot of the time…perhaps there was more to this, I thought.
Shortly after placing my order, I got the depressing e-mail notifying my of the cancellation. Now, I at first wasn’t surprised or too upset over this, BUT, then I got to thinking how I’ve worked in retail on and off since high school and whenever we made a pricing error, no matter how great the error (I’ve been in stores that have lost hundreds of dollars per customer because the employee pricing the display of BBQs left out a digit by error). I get that this would suck for Amazon, but it’s not the customer’s fault they made a pricing error. We as customers are entitled to the merchandise at that price….then of course my email came in with my $25 gift card and I soon forgot about the books I wasn’t going to get and was just happy to get something out of the deal.
I have yet to use my $25 promo but I probably will soon, and I can guarantee I’ll be putting down a lot more than $25 in the order, so in the end on this one, Amazon still wins big when it comes to my order. That being said, I think the company handled this mistake well and were able to quickly quell the masses and avoid what could have been a very nasty PR nightmare had all the orders simply got cancelled with the follow up "piss off, you should’ve known it was a mistake" email. Well played, Amazon.
The only thing that comes from this is that…..Comics (aka trades) need to be cheaper.
No one would dare buy a Howard the Duck omnibus at that $75 price. But when it hit at about $8? Suddenly it’s on Amazon’s Top 10 Overall list. Clearly people are willing to pay for comics but not at those ridiculous prices.
Why can’t, across the board, trade prices be: TPB ($10), HC ($20), Oversized HC ($30), and Omnibus/Absolutes ($50)? To me that is so much better then giving us a $20 TPB or a $25 HC. Obviously when the prices are that ridiculously low, people would buy it no matter what it was. But why not sell comics at these prices? I’d believe that would make more money because there would be more demand for books at a lower cost.
I ordered the autographed gravel omnibus, which was cancelled, but then I got my 25 and bought fables 11 and 12
…
I know a some people who ordered right when it happened with expidited 2 day express shipping and there books got shipped. I kinda glad i missed it cause i wouldve been mad. But i also heard amazon also said they would honor 1 book at that price.
@TNC…come on seriously? There is some truth to the fact that cost could be lowered quite a bit on collected editions, after all they are reptrints and the comic companies are mostly just paying to produce the tangible product. The fact that this proves that demand is high and that collections would sell so much better if the prices were low is just untrue. Yes, if 50, 75, or 100 dollar books were all priced at 8 or 14 dollars then you are right in saying demand would increase (for a relatively short period of time) but at the prices you mention it would never make a big enough impact to sell books like that.
The audience is still small, not matter what the price. Lower the price enough and you will get more people buying comics that didnt before, but that is not going to be significant. Most people that don’t comics don’t read them because they are comic books, not because their prices are high. Lowering the price would create a surge of demand from the already comic buying public, which would result in higher sales, but couldn’t even get close to making the companies more profitable aka. the only way they would do such a thing. People say it’s all about supply and demand, but companies are really only intrested in raising demand however significantly if it means being more profitable.
Some wild, reckless, mad, impetuous estimations of how much this debacle is costing everyone involved. (nobody knows anything.)
Geekdom should be ashamed. I can’t believe Amazon is giving gift cards to people who knowingly ordered books, GOT books, that were under priced and will lead to Amazon losing money. Purposely hurting a retailer that strives to be the cheapest option is something that I would feel guilty about. If your local comic book store cashier accidently rung you up for $5 for $40 worth of books, would you say something? Or would you run around grabbing 100 books, knowing that the cashier is making a mistake?
@HappyHippo: It’s actually not going to hurt Amazon, it’s going to hurt Diamond. And anything that hurts Diamond is a good thing.
Ashamed? I saw a price on a website, and bought some things. They cancelled the orders, and then sent a credit out because of their mistake. I know I didn’t write to complain, and it all came from them. So let’s hold back on the accusations of wrongdoing, just a touch.
I’m guessing it took a little prodding from "unhappy" customers in order for Amazon to give that $25 gift card. Again, would you knowingly try and buy 25 cent comics from your comic book store if they had all their $3 comics in their database wrong? Would you call everyone up, saying you got a great deal at the store, they should go too?
@HappyHippo: If the comic store said "here, we are selling these $3 comics for 25 cents." That’s essentially what Amazon was saying when they listed their prices as such.
I ordered a couple of things, even things outside the Omnibuses.
Howard The Duck Omnibus
Secret War II Omnibus
Ultimates Omnibus
Wolverine Omnibus
other then that I ordered:
X-men: God Loves man Kills hardcover (marked down a few bucks). Old Man Logan (Marked down ten bucks) Daredevil Frank Miller visionaries (All marked down ten bucks). I got the e-mail, wasn’t getting any of the Omnibuses, no big deal, I figured as much, it took me a total of ten seconds to move them back on the wishlist. I’m getting the trades, except OLD MAN LOGAN, which was a bit weird, but whatever.
As for the 25 dollar gift card, that’ll be going towards an Absolute probably. Or God OF War III, haven’t decided yet.
Conor made a really good point. Amazon was crazy smart to offer the $25 credit. 9 times out of 10, you’re gonna spend more than that $25. It’s just human nature.
I was disappointed to find out so late. But amazon has always been good to me, the comic consumer. Often times they have the best deals on HC and TPB, better than instock trades.
Also, they never charge tax (except when I moved to Seattle and that makes absolutely no sense since they are stationed in WA), and they don’t charge for shipping on orders over $25.
In fact I’ve written to iFanboy about feeling guilty buying trades from a source other than LCBS because the deals on amazon are soo good. and money is sooo tight.
Personally, I found it annoying that people complained so much about not getting their extortively low-priced Omnibuses. I wouldn’t expect iFanboy to give me a t-shirt for a dollar just because the ship boned up and had the price printed wrong. To me it akin to robbing someone’s house, but getting caught on the way out. Then following up by asking ‘So, you’re going to give these to me for having such a good go, right?’
Avengers Forever Hardcover, was really looking forward to it too. Oh well, think i’ll use the credit to buy some Walking Dead and Criminal i’ve been wanting to try out.
@conor
I do see your point, but it is hard to compare this to brick&mortar store. Amazon went above and beyond by giving the $25, even with people that got some of the underpriced books, yet some still find what they did illegal, or not right, since they didn’t uphold their "advertised" price.
Maybe a comparable thing would be say a store put out an ad in the paper and and instead of 100.00 it said 10.000, leaving the store in a huge loss if they HAD to sell all of the books for $10. Obviously the store would probably give some incentive to buy things around the store for the people that drove there, but to be pissed that you aren’t getting that obviously underpriced book? Come on.
Barnes and Noble has sent my order for Criminal Hard Cover and Invincible Iron Man. I pre-ordered the Seven Soldiers of Victory HC with my amazon credit. This seems to be a Diamond issue due to the two different online sellers having the same pricing problems with in a couple of days of each other.
@HappyHippo: I don’t have time for people who are pissed that they didn’t get the cheap books. They don’t have a leg to stand on.
yeah.. i’m okay with not getting the cheap books… i used my $25 to preorder RED DEAD: REDEMPTIONS! for PS3
I ordered Mad Men season 3 with my GC.
It’s one thing to have an unsuccessful bank robbery attempt and another thing alltogether to blame the bank afterwards.
I ordered $125 worth of Omnibuses, got nothing. Got my $25 from Amazon. More than I deserve. Amazon f***ing rocks.
And no, Amazon doesn’t owe anyone anything. Look up the Equitable Doctrine of Unilateral Mistake. The fact that they’re giving you a credit is Ghandi-esque.
As usual, something cool happened and I found out about it way after the fact.
@HailScott: It pays to be on Twitter. 🙂
When the customers accepted the price offered by Amazon, a contract was created. Amazon should have to honor the agreement. This $25 credit is not a suitable resolution.
A freind told me about this and he Managed to get both of the Captain America omnibuses. I had already spent a bundle at Instocktrades and I’m glad I didnt splurge even more because it would have just gotten my mouth watering and then I would have been disappointed and who needs that. Still I’m happy for my freind because he’s the biggest Cap fan I’ve ever had the pleaure of knowing(plus he’ll eventually lend them to me. hehehehe) and I think its pretty cool that amazon gave people 25 dollar gift certificates for there trouble. pretty classy.
I ordered:
Wolverine Omnibus
Daredevil (Bendis) Omni
Fantastic Four Omni v1 (for my friend’s dad)
and pre-ordered the JMS/Copiel Thor Omni
Then I thought, "Oh shit, lemme order MOAR!" and ordered:
Old Man Logan HC
Young Avengers HC (the Marvel Omni-light, as I’ve taken to calling the format w/ 2 trades worth of material)
I received the same e-mail as Josh got for the 1st order. I responded in a fairly indignant way, "Blah, blah, blah I work in retail and would’ve had to honor the price, blah blah, undue sense of deserving something!" Only because I have come to the conclusion that being an asshole is the only way to get anything to work for you in these matters (i.e. retail transactions, instances with my bank where I was raked over the coals and my friend bullshitted his way to a refund where he was the one that fucked up, etc). Of course, I didn’t at all take the time to consider how good Amazon has been to me, so when I got the same $25 e-mail, I felt like a massive douchebaggle.
So now I’ve got $25 on Amazon for nothing and Old Man Logan & Young Avengers are on their way to my house for a smidge cheaper than normal. Thanks, Amazon, you’re swell!
I was at a Muse concert in Boston (they put on an excellent show) Saturday night, so I didn’t get my order in until about 1am Sunday morning. By then, most of the books were "will ship in 2 to 3 weeks," so I didn’t really expect to get anything.
Here is what I originally ordered: Fantastic Four Omnibus vol. 1, Secret Wars Omnibus, Secret Wars II Omnibus, Wolverine Omnibus vol. 1, Golden Age Marvel Comics Omnibus vol. 1, The Ultimates Omnibus, Incredible Hulk Omnibus vol. 1, X-Men: Inferno Crossovers (pre-order), The Complete Invincible Library vol. 1, Madman Gargantua, Hellspawn Complete Collection (pre-order), I Kill Giants Titan Edition, Bone One Volume Edition (2 copies, for me and my buddy in Florida), Rising Stars Compendium, X-Men Omnibus vol. 1 (for buddy), Nextwave: Agents of HATE (for buddy), X-Necrosha (pre-order), Realm of Kings (pre-order).
Yes, it’s a lot. But I figured, the more I ordered, the more likely I’d get something. So, the Bone collections shipped immediately, and Ultimates Omnibus shipped. Everything else was canceled, but I expected as much. With the $25 credit (along with $40 I already had as a gift card), I bought Black Dynamite, Fearless, and Kagemusha all on blu-ray. At Barnes & Noble, I ordered Rising Stars Compendium and Hellspawn Complete Collection for a little over $10 each.
So overall, three books from Amazon for $15 a pop and $25 that I got to use on blu-ray? How could I possibly complain? As far as comic collections costing too much, I don’t think I’ve ever paid cover price for a trade or hardcover. Amazon’s normal $63 price-point for an omnibus is already pretty good. You can pay even less if you go to InStockTrades (plug!) or their sister site DCBService.
In regard to the whole "This just proves omnibi should be cheaper!" argument: if this Barnes and Noble order goes through, I’ll have a Captain Britain omnibus that I have less than 1% interest in. Oh, I’ll read it, but I only bought it because it was so cheap and in the midst of frantic buying. If I was at a Barnes and Noble store and it was $20, I think I’d pass on it. $11? I may still pass on it. But, in the buying frenzy that may or may not have been a glitch? I threw in an extra $11. I also own all The Walking Dead trades, but decided to spring for the Compendium because it was ridiculously cheap. I doubt I would have bought it if it was a more "reasonable" $30.
I ordered around 1am Sunday…
Ordered Madman Gargantua, Invincible Complete Library Vol 1, Invinicible Iron Man HC Vol 1 (Fraction), Daredevil by Bendis Omnibus 2, Runaways Vol 1, Criminal Deluxe, and The Ultimates Omnibus… ended up getting Runaways, Ultimates, and Criminal shipped to me; the rest were cancelled. The next day, I also ended up getting the $25 credit for the cancellations. Amazon has been my favorite retailer for a long time now, and this experience has only engendered more goodwill.
Then yesterday, I saw Barnes & Noble had similar pricing on some of the books. I ended up getting Captain Britain Omnibus, Invincible Iron Man HC Vol 1 (Fraction), and Daredevil by Bendis Omnibus Vol 2 shipped to me (for roughly 11.50 a piece). I also ordered Walking Dead Compendium for the same price, but that hasn’t shipped yet. Keeping my fingers crossed.
Aaand my Madman Gargantua was finally cancelled, it’s been a fun ride! 🙂
….I missed it. I knew I shouldn’t have studied that day. Cheap prices are more important than Political Science tests.
Thing is, I bet they sold a lot of non-discounted books too. I bought a bunch of Marvel Omnibus hardcovers, all of which were removed from the order, but I also bought all the Love and Rockets 200+ page softcovers which were selling for around ten bucks (still are) and the Swamp Thing hardcovers (around $16). They canceled the ones they made mistakes on, but obviously not the rest. Bet I’m not alone. And I’m actually pretty psyched to be getting the ones I paid the real price for.
I ordered The Incredible Hulk Omnibus, Criminal and Madman. I’m bummed they were all cancelled, but not angry at Amazon. it was just a mistake. I might use my $25 gift card on the latest The Walking Dead trade and an SAS Survival Guide Handbook.
@PymSlap: "When the customers accepted the price offered by Amazon, a contract was created. Amazon should have to honor the agreement. This $25 credit is not a suitable resolution."
They didn’t have to do anything, they’re not legally obligated to fulfill an error. If a sign outside a store says 99.99 and the wind blows off the first 9, they are not obligated to fulfill that price until they can change the sign back. It’s unreasonable and I think Amazon was classy with the use of the gift cards. They could have sent a letter saying "Due to an error we can’t fulfill the orders, please place them again, with the corrected prices we appreciate your business and apologize for the inconvenience"
I would have loved to get some Omnibuses to fill out my library, running on the assumption they were doing some insane promotion. Such is life though. Ill have to pay proper retail.
@Crucio
Yeah, Noto straightened me out on that.
I ordered the second Bendis/Maleev Daredevil Omnibus and the first Brubaker/Lark Omnibus. I also preordered the Inferno Crossovers Hardcover. Sure I was disappointed, but not exactly surprised by the cancellations. I would say that while the $25 is not necessary as such, I don’t feel guilty about it given the size and wealth of Amazon. However, I would chime in with the fact that my experiences with Amazon, and Amazon Uk in particular, have always been really excellent. And I’ve placed a lot of orders over the years…
When all these awesome deals were going down I snapped up a Leopard skin Snuggie for $14.95… what are the odds of me getting a 25 dollar credit?
I got nothing I ordered and used the gift credit to buy the 2 Swamp Thing HCs.
Man, most of you guys are really lucky. Amazon usually reserves the right to not honor purchase made from glitched prices. I’ve tried taking advantage of unbelievable prices on Amazon before but I would get an email after a while explaining that the price was errorneous and offering to either cancel the order or let me buy it for the real price.
I never heard about this and it really bums me out. It’s not because people got discounts or vouchers (that is rad, mark one up for fanboys ) It’s the fact that amazon sold out of so much and might not get it all back in. I had a big wish list and was going to put an order in fairley soon and being from the land of oz there aint a whole lot of good options for ordering books.
The downside to all of this is that everything that Diamond sells to Amazon is now unbuyable. Only items on my Wish list that can be bought now are Vertigo/DC items. Guess I know what I’m getting for my birthday.
I love Amazon and that’s cool that they extended you the account credit. I feel bad buying trades on Amazon instead of my local store but it’s hard to argue with the price.
I’m with The Dude. This is a piss off. I’ve been waiting to buy a couple of omnibus that keep getting passed up by something better in my shopping cart. Back to ordering from instock trades, no ifanboy kickback there though, is there?
@Poopmonster: Click through to InStockTrades via a banner ad from iFanboy. They’ll get something that way.
I had no idea any of this was going on except, after reading a free copy of "Invincible Iron Man" #1 I went to Amazon to see what the trades ran. There I happened on the deal of a lifetime & ordered the Omnibus for $14.99. Already been delivered too. Probably better I didn’t know what was happening as I would now be broke & have a room full of Omnibus collections.
FYI, Barnes and Noble canceled 4 of the books I ordered, so their sale wasn’t "legit" or to stick it to Amazon as some people were declaring. They did, however, ship my $11 Walking Dead Compendium! Even a blind squirrel finds a nut every once and a while!
InStock sponsors the show, so just going is good enough. Don’t worry about the kickback. But thanks.
Anyone who’s mad at Amazon didn’t try to buy from Barnes & Noble. My order was canceled three minutes before it was supposed to ship without so much as a how-do-you-do, never mind $25 and a mint on my pillow. As my first ever B&N order, it was… inauspicious. As my last ever B&N order, of course, it was one to remember.
@Jimski You won’t get problems at Borders, that’s for sure.
*wearing Border’s nametag and hat*
@Adamjourno Those Swamp Thing trades are the two best graphic novels I got all year! They’re creepy. Hope you like them as much as I do.
Wonder how long it will be until you can order diamond books again from amazon? My birthday is coming up and after 3 years finally got my family to use the wishlist. Bad timing for me I guess.
Bad timing for the indie publishers affected by this.
@Jediaxle . . . Amazon’s graphic novel listings have returned. Alas, the Michael Turner variant for the Old Man Logan graphic novel is still out-of-stock.
sweet thanks PymSlap, guess I go order something now. Some reason not being able to order anything has been driving me crazy. Thinking about Afrodisiac, that sounds great.