Amazon’s other physical retail test: A mini bookstore for Kindle ebooks – GeekWire

It Only Takes up a couple square feet, a small fraction of the size of Amazon’s actual first bookstore in Seattle, but the company has-been quietly making another foray into physical retail – Offering single ebook gift cards for sale under a pilot program at Bartell Drugs in Washington state

The pilot was Launched in October, in time for the holiday shopping season, but Largely it flew under the radar Until Now. Amazon has long offered Preferred overall retail gift cards in many locations, like other digital merchants, but the move to offer cards for specific ebooks is a new move for the company.

Details of the 61-store test Were confirmed last week by Nate Hoffelder of The Digital Reader news site, and I found one of the “Kindle eBooks” kiosks tucked Between Displays of Valentine’s Day candy at my local Bartell Drugs store in Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood this weekend.

Perhaps tellingly, even though the kiosk was well-positioned Toward the front of the store, none of the three employees I spoke INITIALLY With what I was talking Knew About When I Asked If They sold individually Kindle ebook gift cards. (Initially They Told Me They did not.)

But I ended up spotting it on my own, and bought a couple cards to test the service.

The top row of the kiosk features cards for Three- and six-month memberships Kindle Unlimited, for $ 29.99 and $ 49.99 each. Below Those are cards featuring the covers of 20 individually-books, best-sellers across Both fiction and nonfiction, ranging from “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” and Sheryl Sandberg’s “Lean In” to Dan Brown’s “Inferno” and “The Martian “by Andy Weir.

On the back of each card is a quote ebook from an Amazon customer review and a summary of the book, Along With an area for writing a message to the recipient and instructions for redeeming the book by scratching off the claim code and going to a dedicated Amazon url to enter it.

Purchasing the card at the Bartell Drugs Register automatically activates it for use, as with a standard gift card.

Here’s The most interesting part: Any of the cards can be Treated as Also regulate Amazon gift card, if your gift recipient does not like the book you chose for them, or owns Already the title you picked. In other words, it offers the personalization of a hand-picked gift With the flexibility of a gift card regularly. – Another example of Amazon blending the best of physical and digital retail

The card promises That you’ll always get “the lowest online price, plus the balance.” For example, I Purchased a card for “The Martian” for $ 14.99 at the store, but the price online was $ 8.99, and when i redeemed the book, the difference was Automatically added to my gift card balance.

After deciding That I really did not want to 3-month membership Kindle Unlimited (Previously I tested the subscription service and found That I did not use it as much as I planned) I was Able to add the Entire $ 29.99 That balance from card to my gift card balance. Everything worked smoothly.

This is the latest example of Amazon Initiatives in testing out new physical retail, but as NOTED by the Digital Reader’s Hoffelder, the company is not the first to try this concept. Most other e-book sellers who’ve gone down this path Have not seen much success.

Whether it turns out to be worthwhile for Amazon remains to be seen. Even During the checkout process, the concept was a novelty Clearly Bartell Drugs to the employees at my local store, indicating Perhaps That They Have not Been selling a lot since the October launch.

We’ve Contacted Amazon for more details on the pilot, and to see if it will be expanded to additional stores and regions.