For April, the Douglas County (Colo.) Libraries ebook price report turns back to the top 25 bestselling ebooks from Digital Book World. Overall, libraries fare better in this comparison, with 11 of the 25 titles available through OverDrive and 10 through 3M. Still, there are two titles that are only available digitally and yet are not carried by either major library ebook provider (Wait for You by Jennifer Armentrout and Just One Night by Eve Gaddy). With no print version to purchase, library patrons are completely shut off from these two bestsellers.
Another interesting new element this month are two cases of drastic price differences between OverDrive and 3M. While in almost every other case going back through these reports the two companies have had the same ebook prices, this month there are two glaring differences. Gone Girl, the ebook Random House loves to discount, is $25 for OverDrive libraries, but a massive $75 from 3M. Defending Jacob, also from a Random House imprint, is $7.99 on OverDrive, but $78 from 3M.
This month’s report starts to show that it really is a case of OverDrive and 3M, not OverDrive or 3M. If a library can afford to go with both systems, there are certainly benefits. Comparison shopping two of the titles on this list would have saved a library over $100. More importantly, having both systems increases availability to 13 of the top 25 ebook titles and gives readers more than 50% access to the list from their library.
The full report can be accessed here.