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How Canadians save money when buying books through Amazon.com

If you’ve ever noticed the pri­cing on the back of a paper­back avail­able in Canada, you’ll notice that there are two prices lis­ted; US and Canadian. With the cur­rent exchange rate (1.064 USD -> CAD) I thought I’d run a quick ana­lys­is on pur­chas­ing four books from Amazon.ca and Amazon.com, and see which would be…

If you’ve ever noticed the pri­cing on the back of a paper­back avail­able in Canada, you’ll notice that there are two prices lis­ted; US and Canadian.

With the cur­rent exchange rate (1.064 USD -> CAD) I thought I’d run a quick ana­lys­is on pur­chas­ing four books from Amazon.ca and Amazon.com, and see which would be the best buy.

                    AMAZON.CA   USD         AMAZON.COM  USD
The Dip             $11.68      $12.39      $10.36      $10.36
Wikinomics          $20.48      $21.72      $17.13      $17.13
Getting Things Done $13.32      $14.12      $16.47      $16.47
Naked Conversations $20.15      $21.37      $16.47      $16.47      Saving (USD)
Totals                          $69.59 		        $60.43      $9.16

As you can see, on those four items, you’d qual­i­fy for free ship­ping, and save $ 9.16 in the process.

Now this meth­od won’t work for everything, as some items Amazon.com sells are duti­able upon entry into Canada.

And, of course, prices fluc­tu­ate fre­quently on these online ser­vices, so your mileage may vary.

But this does stim­u­late some questions…why are Cana­dian book­sellers still selling books at the Cana­dian price as marked on the book? Don’t they real­ize they’ll lose busi­ness by char­ging at this rate? Would­n’t it make more sense for them to be com­pet­it­ive, or are the profit mar­gins so slim that they have to use that price to cov­er their oper­at­ing expenses?

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3 responses to “How Canadians save money when buying books through Amazon.com”

  1. S. Tremblay Avatar
    S. Tremblay

    I am guess­ing that there are Cana­dian laws that would pre­vent them to do so. Plus they prob­ably buy them at a marked down price from the CDN price so to make their mark they have to charge the CDN price. I’m sure it does­n’t make them happy. They’d rather sell at the lower price if they could.

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  2. Brad Grier Avatar
    Brad Grier

    Not sure about the laws, but yeah, you’re likely right. They ordered the books months ago, at a spe­cif­ic price factor­ing in a spe­cif­ic profit margin.

    Now the value of the dol­lar has changed, the prin­ted price on the back of the book has­n’t and if they choose to com­pete against the USD price, they have to sell the book at a lower price, redu­cing profit.

    Reply
  3. Canadians save more money ordering books through Amazon.com at blog.bradgrier.net

    […] June, when the exchange rate was 1.064 USD -> CAD, I pos­ted “How Cana­dians save money when buy­ing books through Amazon.com. Now, with the rate being close to par, and many start­ing to think about Christ­mas shop­ping, it […]

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