Technically our books should never be in stock so an 'out of stock' notice shouldn't really be cause for concern.
We quite proudly use print on demand which means that usually books aren’t printed until they’re sold, our customers get brand new copies, your book need never go out of print, we keep in the black financially and we're looking after the environment..
However, some of the big retailers will often buy five or more in one go and then when they've sold the last one will put up the 'out of stock' notice. It seems to imply there may be some difficulty with getting the text. If Amazon does this, I use the 'report an issue' to remind them that our printer does big print runs several times a week and the title should only take two to five working days to get into their hands. So they get the book to Prime customers within three to six working days.
We can also provide books but bizarrely it sometimes takes a little longer for our orders to be processed. Plus we have to charge shipping on up to four books. Once a customer orders five or more the per unit shipping plummets and we can waive it.
We can never dictate to retailers what to do. Annoyingly Waterstones often says it will take several weeks to get the book. But it doesn't. The printer does huge print runs for Waterstones – this may include a couple of ours and a couple from hundreds more small presses.
We've even had Gardner's (the biggest UK book wholesaler) apologise for giving misleading information.
If you’re finding availability problems, they shouldn’t exist. Keep calm and notify us. We'll put whoever it is right. Great if you have a go as well.
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