Southport again & GBG prices.

Hi Mike, according to . . .

In message , MikeMcG wrote

The current special price for CAMRA members £13.50 (£11 plus £2.50 p&p). The £10 price is the pre-order, pay by direct debit, subscription..

The Amazon price has fluctuated between £7.50 and £9.50 - if you want the cheapest price you may have to check on a daily basis with the cheaper offers often being at the weekends. We are expecting 3 GBGs to be delivered today or tomorrow, ordered from Amazon at £7.49 each (including postage) . Some of this money will go to a local CAMRA branch as it was ordered via their site as a click-through Amazon shop.

I just bought a copy for £7.49 (+ a CD I wanted, to bump it above the free delivery minimum - I didn't fancy the "Amazon Prime" thing, in case I forgot to cancel it & they stung me for the £49!)

Interesting about the local CAMRA branch having the click-through & getting some cash from it - if I'd known I would have done that too.

Out if interest - which branch(es) are doing this? - great idea, but I thought the DD-subscription prices were supposed to be the cheapest way - seems a little unfair that Amazon can undercut by so much. cheers MikeMcG

In message , MikeMcG wrote

Amazon price currently £7.49 on this site

In message , MikeMcG wrote

If you have a Sat Nav you may want to check the CAMRA HQ site as they are soon to release a companion Points Of Interest (POI) file for around £5. You still need the GBG 2009 for the details of the pubs but the POI file will tell your Sat Nav how to find them.

In message , Alan wrote

"Snelly" also mentioned that the GBG was launched today - the other day I had an email from Amazon.co.uk telling me I coiuld pre-order the GBG for £7.49 (my past custom made me eligible for free next day p&p too).

According to the CAMRA site, the members' special pre-order price is £10

Very odd.

Can someone remind me how much the Direct Debit GBG subscription price is?

Cheers, MikeMcG

I don't understand why anyone would buy a book so out of date before it's even printed! I'll get me coat......

We had a discussion about this at a branch social on Tuesday evening. It's further complicated by the fact that pubs can buy theirs in bulk from CAMRA HQ for less than the branch charge them, so we've probably over-ordered this time.

The whole thing's a dog's dinner and it needs sorting out, quickly.

I paid £10 for my copy, rather than wait for spamazon to deliver me a cheaper one, and to make sure the £10 went to CAMRA funds.

By & large I've almost always had good experiences in pubs I've found via the GBG. Obviously, by their nature guide books are going to be somewhat out of date, but as I say, I've found the GBG very reliable.

What's the other options - pot luck? pub websites? (unbiased? up-to- date?)

IIRC I think there was an updates page for the GBG too? cheers MikeMcG

In message , Mike Roebuck wrote

You may find that CAMRA make more from an Amazon sale at £7.49 than they do with a £10 sale directly to a member.

Sorry, I can't see the logic in that statement.

Care to explain?

Hmmm.

We get a large order at once in September, and distribute it to pubs and members in our own time, at no cost to CAMRA other than initial transport/distribution (and production, obviously).

Spread it over the year, and how many times does CAMRA have to pay transport costs to cover amazon sales? Surely that increases the amount of admin, too? (AFAIUI amazon is not a stockholder).

Of course, if future sales are only via intermediaries such as amazon, the equation might change, but I for one prefer to get my copy at a meeting or social, when it's fresh off the press, and without unnecessary additional postage costs added.

In message , Mike Roebuck wrote

For any book distribution organisation to be highly efficient they would need to sending out large number of book 365 days a year and not just for the month of September. It may cost more in administration or for inexperienced part time staff for CAMRA to send books to individual members or branches than the discount they give to a bulk seller.

In message , Mike Roebuck wrote

Do you pay for the books at the time when you pick-up or is there administration involved where CAMRA keeps a record of how many books you have taken and then matches this to a single payment later, or even multiple payments later?

I would guess in some branches that the person collecting the books would charge the collection costs to expenses which may be the 'hidden' administration cost.

The majority of members don't attend meetings and so they must obtain their copies elsewhere, either directly from CAMRA which must involve paid staff and not volunteers, or from a third party.

This must have been factored into the price negotiated with a third party distributor and reflected in the price that Amazon charge/

But are you paying £7.49 that Amazon are charging today or something more? Sales to members at meetings must be an insignificant percentage of the total sales for the publication.

In some respects it may be better to have a cheap price from Amazon as it could result in a lot more sales. After all the GBG is a campaigning tool to persuade people to drink real ale and to find decent pubs and not necessarily a tool for the self promotion of CAMRA.

An up to date online version of the GBG?

You could try the good pub guide.

It does still mention the odd real ale pub, but it' mostly focuses on more up-market rural dining inns.

Only if you like things that a more out of date than the year before lasts Good Beer Guide

Contact the branch or branches local to the area you are visiting. Most of the time you not only get the "didn't quite make it into this years guide" pubs you also get the "this is going into the next years guide entries" pubs.

That's what I do - with the best will in the world the GBG is out of date before it gets to print. An online version would be the solution surely?