Online retailer JD faces backlash from local book publishers amid low-price strategy

Chinese book publisher Motie Group has warned it has halted the shipping of all books to online retailer JD, as a dispute between the two companies over low-priced promotional books during the mid-year 618 shopping festival became increasingly heated. Shen Haobo, founder of Motie, issued a lengthy public post on his WeChat account urging JD to remove all Motie-published books and return them to the company. According to local media outlet Yicai, the source of the dispute is a model that allows JD to sell books at any price it wants, with the publisher effectively unable to control the price of its goods on the platform. E-commerce platforms’ relationship with merchants has deteriorated amid the escalation of the former’s ongoing low-price strategy. Yicai quoted one of JD’s sales and procurement staff who was responsible for the book category as saying that the platform only wants consumers to buy good books cheaply. Shen retorted by labeling the platform’s behavior as “hooliganism.” [Yicai, in Chinese]