Rare Book Monthly
Now Where Goes Alibris?
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Does Alibris or Oak Hill have any additional corporate purchases in mind, we enquired? Kohn had no certain answer or specifics, but did leave the door clearly open for expansion. However, he did seek to quell any rumors of Alibris becoming combined with ProQuest and its print-on-demand business. "We may also purchase or combine with other businesses," Mr. Kohn said, "although we have no plans to combine with any Oak Hill owned companies. We would only do so if they add to the long term prospects of Alibris." Kohn pointed out that Oak Hill does not own ProQuest. ProQuest is a public company in which Oak Hill holds an interest.
Asked specifically about booksellers' concerns about print-on-demand listings filling up customer searches, Kohn had this to say: "We recognize but are not overly concerned about print-on-demand listings. Our concern revolves around professionalism. Professional sellers are welcome to list any book at all on Alibris and our customers can decide which of them are worth buying. It is important to us, however, that when our customers buy a book, they are buying from a seller who is as reliable and trustworthy as we represent them to be."
For all the changes underneath, Mr. Kohn emphasized the visible changes will be small. For sellers and buyers alike, it is essentially business as usual. "Although this is an important event in the life of Alibris," Kohn told us, "it is not one that is likely to be visible to most sellers or customers. We will continue to grow sales and services. We will continue to bring in new retail customers, business partners, and libraries. With Oak Hill behind us, we will become more successful by making our sellers successful."
We would certainly agree that despite the lack of visible changes, this is an important event in the life of Alibris. Going back to its early days as a private booksellers' database known as Interloc, Alibris has been a leader in the field of online bookselling. However, it became a crowded field, and while it is second only in sales to Abebooks in the area of used books, the reality is that the giants Amazon and eBay are competitors too. Particularly after their failed public offering, we have heard the predictions of Alibris' ultimate demise under the pressure of larger and better-financed competitors. Now, the whole equation has changed. Alibris has joined the ranks of the well-financed, larger competitors. What, specifically, Oak Hill has in mind for Alibris is unclear. Most of the comments we have seen could be described as "general," promises of growth and improvement without detailed specifics being laid out. However, we find it difficult to believe an investor such as Oak Hill would purchase a company like Alibris without something specific in mind. Only time will tell exactly what this might be, but we suspect this a new ballgame. Backs to the wall, Alibris just hit a home run in the bottom of the ninth. Now we can all sit back and watch what happens in extra innings.
