Books are essential to society as a source of inspiration, emotion, and entertainment. Throughout our history, books have served as a connecting point among people, and as a fundamental source of education and understanding of perspectives and cultures.
E-commerce enables access to a diverse cultural offering
At Amazon in Spain, we provide access to a diverse cultural offering that reaches readers across the country, including those without nearby bookstores or cultural establishments. This is aligned with e-commerce’s role in enabling access to diverse cultures, which is widely recognised by Spaniards. This was the conclusion in the "Reading, Writing, and Literary Creation in Spain" study carried out by Beruby for Amazon.es, based on a survey of 3,000 Spaniards between 18 and 80 years old.
The study revealed that 76% of Spaniards believe that buying books online makes reading more accessible to everyone. This role of e-commerce as a provider of access to reading is acknowledged across Spain (in rural settings the percentage rises to 78%). The fact that e-commerce also enables access to a wide selection of books is also appreciated by Spanish readers, with 59% of participants emphasising the importance of e-commerce in finding books of all genres.
Helping to spread reading across the country
According to the latest report from the Federation of Publishers' Guild of Spain, 68.4% of Spaniards read books. The reading landscape in Spain is varied, with rural areas showing lower reading rates than large cities. E-commerce is particularly important in enabling access to books in rural areas and smaller cities. More than half of survey respondents in small cities, and a quarter of respondents aged 61 to 80 in rural areas, use e-commerce to access books. It’s also noteworthy that almost one fifth of book shipments made by Amazon are to towns with under 10,000 inhabitants. We continue investing to reach customers, with our logistics network covering 100% of postal codes in Spain and reaching over 90% within two days.
Making reading easier
According to an Amazon study, 45% of Spaniards appreciate that e-commerce allows them to find all sorts of books. The book store at Amazon.es allows customers to choose books from a wide selection of genres in paperback, online or audiobook format, and have them conveniently delivered to their home.
Together with other stakeholders, we contribute in taking Spanish culture beyond the country’s borders, enabling books by various publishers and Spanish authors to be read worldwide. Additionally, thanks to our distribution network, authors who write and express themselves in other official languages from Spain - such as Catalan, Galician or Basque - can be read in their original form or translated into Spanish.
We support the activities of publishers in Spain, as they contribute to extending the lifespan of books and thus keep catalogues alive by selling both existing titles and new releases (half of customers shopping on Amazon.es opt for books older than two years). For small and medium-sized publishers, our store provides a digital visibility they may not always have in physical spaces.
Booksellers and publishers can expand their business’ reach by choosing to sell on Amazon. Currently, more than 600 bookstores in Spain use our services to reach readers who cannot visit their physical stores.
In addition to accessing books, our work is aimed at improving the reader’s experience by offering services such as Kindle Unlimited, a monthly subscription with access to a catalogue of more than one million e-books, including works by Spanish-speaking independent authors, such as Fernando Gamboa or Kristel Ralston, among others. In addition, our Prime subscription includes Prime Reading, which allows reading enthusiasts to access a wide selection of the best Kindle books, great titles, and best sellers.
Finally, our innovations in the field of e-books also benefit the reader’s experience: both Kindle and Alexa devices can adapt the reading experience to the different needs of each person. From adjusting font sizes on Kindle to asking Alexa to read a book to you, Amazon devices offer a multitude of possibilities to bring reading closer to everyone.
Helping independent authors thrive
Amazon also allows books by independent authors and publishers to be purchased anywhere in the world. Thanks to Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP), thousands of independent authors have been able to self-publish their books, receiving around 70% of the revenue generated by their work, while retaining editorial control. In Spain we see an average of 25 titles by self-published authors among the top 100 best-selling books in the Kindle Store every week.
Our Amazon Storyteller Literary Award, open to authors using our self-publishing tool, celebrated its tenth edition for Spanish-language works in 2023. Since its launch in 2014, this literary prize has established itself as the premier literary competition for self-published authors and has continued to grow, accumulating a catalogue of over 30,000 titles from authors representing more than 60 countries. In the last edition, the award went to the thriller “Palabras de Ceniza” by Pilar González Álvarez, which was selected from more than 5,000 participating titles, all self-published through Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP). At the awards ceremony, Pilar, who has self-published 13 books with KDP, said: "KDP provides a unique opportunity to all self-published writers, putting at our disposal such a useful tool that allows us to achieve the dream of seeing our work published come true.”
As part of our commitment to reading and writing, we established the first self-publishing library at the headquarters of the Ortega-Marañón Foundation, in collaboration with the Ortega-Marañón Foundation, donating an initial collection of over 200 titles, including the winning and finalist works of the ten editions of the Amazon Storyteller Literary Award. The library aims to serve as a place that brings the world of self-publishing closer to all kinds of readers, and contributes to analysing this new mode of creation in the Spanish literary landscape.
The availability of independent publishing has resulted in a more diverse set of voices telling their stories and then making those stories available to more readers than ever before. This is what has allowed the Spanish author Lorena Franco to succeed with her novels, which have reached more than 300,000 readers around the world, allowing her to grow as a creator. “For me, writing is the perfect mix between passion and vocation, but it wasn't until 2015 when I discovered Kindle Direct Publishing and decided to go one step further and self-publish my first book. Since then, I have self-published more than twenty novels,” Lorena said.
At Amazon we also work to ensure consumer confidence and the protection of professionals against other potential harmful practices. We have machine learning experts, software developers and researchers who are actively working to protect authors and readers from all types of abuse. We encourage authors and publishers to report any suspicious communications or sites to us. These reports give us information that we can use to help protect authors and publishers, and identify bad actors.
Amazon: A growth engine for Spain and its cultural industry
Amazon has been operating in Spain since 2011. During this time, we've become a growth engine for the Spanish economy and an integral part of the country's business fabric, both in urban and rural communities. Books have led the way for Amazon and culture since our arrival in Spain, and following this path we have expanded our cultural imprint through services like Prime Video, Amazon Music, Audible, Kindle, and Twitch.
As a pioneering company, our mission is to innovate on behalf of our customers. This has allowed us to leave our mark in different cultural industries, from access to books, audiobooks, podcasts, movies, TV shows, music and games, to our contributions at every point in the book value chain. It is precisely our culture of leadership, innovation, and entrepreneurship that makes our commitment to cultural creation an essential part of what Amazon is today in Spain and around the world.
