Particularly when one comes from a conservative family and has many conversations where their beliefs are challenged, they tend to assume that the publishing landscape works the same way. This week, we answer a reader question about how to publish safely and sustainably despite one’s political opinions.
Get the People’s Guide to Publishinghere, and the workbook here! Want to stay up to date on new podcast episodes and happenings at Microcosm? Subscribe to our newsletter!
During a recent phone call, we asked her how she defines “independent publisher” and her answer was “we know it when we see it.” “Indie” has grown to mean “dependent on Amazon” and Orwell would be proud. In the past decade, publishing has become overwhelmed by jargon. Well you might say that it goes back much further than that (and we probably wouldn’t disagree), but the jargon that is designed to intentionally obfuscate has grown considerably to the point that we have to define things like “small press publisher.”
Get the People’s Guide to Publishinghere, and the workbook here! Want to stay up to date on new podcast episodes and happenings at Microcosm? Subscribe to our newsletter!
Once upon a time, Justine Norton-Kertson corrupted young minds by teaching high school history, civics, and economics from a leftist perspective, then spent almost a decade as a community and union organizer. Nowadays, Justine continues working to corrupt the youth, primarily as a publisher, author, screenwriter, and podcaster. They founded Android Press and Solarpunk Magazine in 2022 and are editor-in-chief for both.
Most recently, Justine wrote Utopian Witch, a book of solarpunk rituals, spells, and practices for radical action towards a positive future.
Read on for our interview with Justine, where they talk about writing, working with us Microcosm folks, and what they’re working on next. Below that, check out an excerpt from the book!
What inspired you to write your book?
Utopian Witch is inspired by a deep sense of urgency and a profound belief in the power of community and individual action. I’ve always been passionate about environmentalism and social justice. I’ve also been a practitioner of witchcraft for decades, and early on was inspired by the feminist and social justice oriented craft taught by Starhawk. I began to see clear connections between the principles of solarpunk—a movement that envisions a sustainable and equitable future—and the transformative power of magick. I also noticed quite a few other folks in the solarpunk movement who practice some type of witchcraft or other new age spiritualities.
The idea that we can blend practical, real-world actions with spiritual practices to effect change is incredibly empowering. In solarpunk, I found a philosophy that not only addresses the ecological and social crises we face but does so with a spirit of radical hope and creativity. It’s about imagining and building a world that works for everyone and respects the Earth. In the same way, as a witch I’m familiar with the power of intention and ritual in shaping our reality. By combining solarpunk ideals with magickal practices, I saw an opportunity to create a resource that could inspire others to take action, both spiritually and practically. I wanted to provide tools and spells that could help people feel empowered to make a difference, to feel connected to a broader movement, and to envision a utopian future where humanity lives in harmony with nature.
Writing this book was my way of weaving together my passions for the environment, social justice, and magick into a cohesive guide that could help others on their journey. It’s about creating change on both a personal and collective level, using the power of witchcraft to fuel our dreams for a better world.
What was it like to publish with Microcosm?
Publishing with Microcosm has been such a great experience. This is my first time publishing a book from the author’s side of the table. I’m also editor-in-chief at Android Press, so I know how challenging the editorial process can sometimes be. But working with the folks at Microcosm has been so easy and enjoyable. My editors were incredibly helpful in so many ways, from working through the best way to structure the book to helping ensure the prose reads well and has the intended impact. I can only hope my future publishing experiences as an author are equally positive.
What was the submission/query process like for you?
I thought the submission/query process was easy and straightforward. The Microcosm website outlines really clearly how to submit a query. I was actually surprised how quickly I heard back with a positive response, because I know how long the query process can often take. Whether it’s with agents or publishers, they usually have no less than a mountain of queries and manuscript submissions to sift through.
What else have you written?
I actually spend a significant amount of my free time writing. I’m about 40,000 words into the first draft of a book about the influence of nerds and the evolution of nerd character tropes in horror movies. I also write a lot of fiction, actually more than I write nonfiction. I recently had a short story called “Rabbits, Rivers, and Prickly Pears,” published in World Weaver Press’s Solarpunk Creatures anthology and another short story called “Do Me Out” that was published by Utopia Science Fiction Magazine. That one’s an apocalyptic hopepunk story set in Oregon’s Columbia River Gorge. I’ve written a couple novellas in the climate fiction and horror genres that are in various stages of revision or querying, and I’m currently co-authoring a climate fiction novel that blends surrealism, zombies, and solarpunk’s focus on DIY culture and climate solutions. But wait, that’s not all! I’ve also co-authored a horror script that is about to start being pitched to producers. Fingers crossed!
What are you currently reading?
I’ve definitely been on a horror kick lately. I’m currently reading an eldritch horror novella by P.L. McMillan called Sisters of the Crimson Vine, about a cult of nuns who grow their own grapes to make a mysteriously intoxicating wine. And they really hate the Catholic Church. I also just bought Paul Tremblay’s latest novel, Horror Movie, which just published this week. I haven’t started reading it yet because I’m trying to finish Sisters of the Crimson Vine first, but I’m really excited to dive into Tremblay’s latest.
What’s the best book you read in the last year?
Full disclosure, this is a book my publishing company, Android Press published, but even if that weren’t the case, this would still be my favorite book I’ve read this year. The book is a novella called “The Year of Return,” and it’s the debut by Ghanaian author Ivana Akotowaa Ofori. It’s a chilling yet hopeful ghost story about the ghosts of Africans who were captured and died during the Middle Passage who rise up from the depths of the Atlantic Ocean to seek various forms of revenge on the ancestors of their captors and killers.
What’s next for you? I recently finished the manuscript for a follow up to Utopian Witch that’s about using tarot cards as a community tool in the fight to build a better world. And I’m really excited about diving into the editorial process for that next book. I also recently helped start a production company called Nerd Horror Media (@nerdhorror on TikTok and Instagram), and am keeping my fingers crossed that we’re able to secure funding to produce our first independent horror film.
Here’s an excerpt from Chapter 2 of Utopian Witchcalled “Radical Hope, Radical Politics, and Punk Magick”
Before we move on to solarpunk spiritual practices and spells, a look at the relationship between radical hope, radical politics, and magick deserves something of its own discussion. Over the years, one question I’ve heard with some frequency, particularly from those who are discovering solarpunk for the first time, is how a genre that’s all about utopia qualifies as punk. It’s a fair question. Afterall, aren’t punks rude people who listen to loud and angry music? Aren’t punks those crude and obnoxious anarchist kids sitting in the gutter with ukuleles and face tattoos, asking for change and leftovers? Even in science fiction literature and fantasy literature, -punk is all about resisting, rebelling, and fighting against corruption even if the odds are insurmountable.
So where’s the punk in utopia?
The first part of the answer to that question is, despite its utopian focus, solarpunk is no different than other -punk literary genres in that resistance and rebellion are foundational elements. In his 2014 article, “Solarpunk: Notes Toward a Manifesto,” Adam Flynn, one of the early writers and thinkers on the solarpunk genre, asserts that “There’s an oppositional quality to solarpunk, but it’s an opposition that begins with infrastructure as a form ofresistance.”28 This is evident in the genre’s focus on dismantling fossil fuel infrastructure in developing and expanding renewable energy infrastructure.
Seven years later, in the summer of 2021, “A Solarpunk Manifesto,” was published online by Regenerative Design, a permaculture training, consulting, and design firm. That article places the -punk in solarpunk within the well-established tradition of resistance. “The ‘punk’ in solarpunk,” it says, “has to do with rebellion, counterculture, post-capitalism, decolonialism and enthusiasm.” That statement reflects solarpunk’s well-established stress on the expected parts of punk: nonwestern cultures and radical, liberatory political theory and praxis.
The last couple words in the above quote—“decolonialism and enthusiasm”— point us in another direction, toward the idea that hope is punk as fuck and is capable of representing the -punk in solarpunk all on its own. In that vein, Regenerative Design’s solarpunk manifesto continues: “We are solarpunks because optimism has been taken away from us and we are trying to take it back,” and “we are solarpunks because the only other options are denial or despair.”
Since we live in a dystopian reality, we’re robbed of our optimism and often see hope as naivete. As a result, we’re engaged in a struggle to restore that hope, because without it, we can’t win. Put more simply: in a world full of despair, hope is an act of rebellion in its own right.
But the hope of solarpunk isn’t a naive hope. We aren’t talking about blind faith or uncritical Pollyanna optimism. Rather, the hope implicit in solarpunk is what University of Chicago philosopher Jonathan Lear termed “radical hope,” and what NYU research professor José Esteban Muñoz argued is a key component of queer utopianism.
So what is radical hope? It’s the kind of hope earned through oppression and struggle, and in the face of annihilation, at the hands of seemingly insurmountable force. It’s a hope that, faced with cultural or environmental collapse, enables us to keep moving forward day after day, to keep working toward a better world, to keep demanding utopia, and to keep resisting and struggling, even in the face of overwhelming odds.
While on the surface this may seem like naive optimism, it’s not. Instead, radical hope is the realization that if we’re to go on at all, then hope in resistance and radical system change is our only option.
That sure sounds punk as fuck to me.
Radical hope doesn’t only fit the punk ethos and drive the activist spirit. It’s also an extremely valuable tool for solarpunk witches and the practice of punk magick. There is, in fact, a direct relationship between radical hope and practicing magick.
At its most simple, magick involves four basic steps:
feeling a strong, guttural, and visceral desire for something,
generating the willpower to make it real,
using those feelings to build up a bunch of powerful energy, and
focusing that energy into a visualization related to the target of your magickal work.
For witches, radical hope provides a source for the guttural, visceral desire that is fuel, fire, and spark for our magickal spellwork. When your spiritual hope draws its strength from a lifetime of struggle and oppression against insurmountable odds—a reality for most witches—you’re more likely to have a deep well of strong feelings, desires, and righteous anger to draw upon when building energy and power for your spells.
And that is the punk magick of radical hope.
Justine Norton-Kertson lives in rural Oregon with their partner, puppies, cats, goats, and bunnies, where they enjoy gardening, kayaking, writing, and making short films. They can be found online on Instagram and TikTok @utopianwitchcraft, or at www.justinenortonkertson.com.
It happens all the time. One of our distributed publishers got in touch, horrified and terrified that MacMillan had just published the same book that she did the week before. She thought it would cannibalize her sales. Many authors and publishers keep this stuff close to the chest. Not us. We follow the Paul Hawken school of being your best, individualized self.
Get the People’s Guide to Publishinghere, and the workbook here! Want to stay up to date on new podcast episodes and happenings at Microcosm? Subscribe to our newsletter!
Since the mid-1990s, the secretive cell organization calling itself the Earth Liberation Front (ELF, or Elves) has waged a brazen campaign of property damage and arson attacks against entities they hold responsible for environmental destruction, including timber companies, ski resorts, slaughterhouses, and car dealerships.
In Burning Rage of a Dying Planet: The FBI vs. the Earth Liberation Front, former ELF spokesperson Craig Rosebraugh charts the history and ideology of the ELF, as well as the repression strategies the government uses to destroy activist movements—including tactics we continue to see wielded against global liberation movements today. Rosenbraugh himself was the subject of a shocking New York Times article last year detailing the efforts of an informant connected to the FBI and the CIA to draw him into a book contract designed never to reach publication, but which provided authorities the opportunity to comb his drafts for clues that might help them apprehend ELF conspirators. Rosenbraugh, though, only ever transmitted anonymous communiques, and when he made a discovery about the man posing as his “book packager” that he writes “made my heart race, made my breath vanish, and sent me off to gather every weapon I had in my house,” the project came to an uneasy end.
Luckily, Rosenbraugh was still determined to let his story see the light of day after this harrowing ordeal, and the book was originally published in 2004. Twenty years later, Microcosm is proud to release this revised and updated edition, featuring a new foreword from Extinction Rebellion co-founder Tamsin Osmond. Burning Rage remains a valuable and illuminating insider account of the ongoing battle between radical environmentalist movements and the powers of the state; one that offers frank insight into the great personal cost of political action, but also the urgency of collective resistance to capitalist violence.
Publishers often think of booksellers as our frontline marketing force; the people who we outsource our jobs to. This week, Janet Geddis of Avid Bookshop does a great job of outlining the actual role that bookstores play in a daily role. It’s more matchmaking than pushing the newest thing on some poor, unsuspecting browser. It’s a deep game of familiarity that ultimately results in hilarity of two people of disparate backgrounds relating to each other in the store at the same time. Publishers interested in taking her up on her “Hang out in my store and learn what bookselling entails” offer, get in touch!
Get the People’s Guide to Publishinghere, and the workbook here! Want to stay up to date on new podcast episodes and happenings at Microcosm? Subscribe to our newsletter!
Welcome to the next installment of the Bookstore Solidarity Project! Every month, we’ll be highlighting indie bookstore owners and booksellers across the country(and beyond!)
Your name and pronouns? David (he/him) & Dara (she/her) Landry
Tell us a little bit about the store and your community. CLASS Bookstore is a Black-owned, family operated, indie bookstore based in Houston, TX. We are based in the Third Ward community and we like the following things about where we are: our proximity to two universities (Texas Southern University and University of Houston) and a high school (Jack Yates High School, the alma mater of George Floyd); the positive relationships that we have built with the members of the community; something good is always going on in Third Ward (Jazz Concerts at Emancipation Park; TSU Homecoming; UH Frontier Fiesta; Third Ward Block Party). We have a pet dog named Catcher, named after J.D. Salinger’s book, Catcher in the Rye.
What got you into bookselling? The thing that got us into indie bookselling was our desire to actively resist the so-called “decline” of the Black-owned bookstore in America. Books have always been important to us from a young age and we felt that it was a business that we felt passionate about doing. Once we had talked to a few Black-owned bookstores that had been around for awhile and gain some perspective, we decided to make it happen.
How did you choose your store’s name? The reasons why we named our store CLASS Bookstore are the following: it’s easy to write and remember; the word “CLASS” elicits the idea of literacy, social strata, and how one should view reading all at once. We capitalize the word CLASS so that it will stand out, very much like the late rapper MF DOOM capitalized his name.
What’s something about your store that you think will surprise people? We are the bookstore that loves streetwear! We consider ourselves part of the sneaker and streetwear community and we love to dress fly and step out for events. We also incorporate elements from the streetwear and sneaker community in everything that we do, from the presentation of our physical space, to the merch that we release in store.
What are some of you favorite ways your community supports your store? Every first Sunday of the month, we have a growing contingent of people who love poetry and spoken word who come to the store and share their work with each other and have been doing so every month for the past year or so. It is a safe space for people of all types to come to the shop and either spectate or participate. This is totally community organized and CLASS Bookstore just provides the physical space to do the event. Another way that our community comes through and supports us is our monthly event on first Saturdays called “Ladies First Saturdays”, where from 12p – 3p CST, women can come to CLASS Bookstore and have tea, talk, or just be. We have music playing according to a pre-selected theme and we sometimes even have speakers come through and talk on a variety of topics, such as mental health, metaphysics, and naturopathy.
How can customers who aren’t local shop your shelves and support you? People can shop with us on our website, and if they can’t find what they are looking for on our website, they can shop with us through our Bookshop affiliate link.
Anything else you’d like to share? Thank you so much, Microcosm! We can’t wait to visit you all in person!
Be sure to follow CLASS Bookstore on their Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, and Tiktok, and check back in a few weeks for their podcast episode!
Katie Haegele has been passionate about cats for decades. They have been some of the most meaningful relationships in her life. This time around she’s organizing other people to share the most touching, heartwarming, wacky, and unbelievable stories about the behavior and emotional range of cats in her eighth book, Cat Party!
Get the People’s Guide to Publishinghere, and the workbook here! Want to stay up to date on new podcast episodes and happenings at Microcosm? Subscribe to our newsletter!
Much hullaballoo and many predictions have been made about how AI will “disrupt” the publishing industry. Typically, with a new technology the steps are 1) fear the new way 2) figure out how to embrace it in a practical sense. How will AI affect publishers? Is the fear substantiated? What can publishers do?
(Note: We are aware that the video capture is frozen on and off for the first two minutes. Enjoy the listening experience during that time!)
Get the People’s Guide to Publishinghere, and the workbook here! Want to stay up to date on new podcast episodes and happenings at Microcosm? Subscribe to our newsletter!
Usually, when we tell strangers that we work in publishing, they picture us crafting the latest bit of editorial brilliance from an emerging, young mind over a candle-lit typewriter. Or they mourn the death of the publishing industry with some imaginary dreck like “nobody reads anymore.”
For better (and some days, for worse), paper books remain more popular than ever, especially with young people. This leads to an ever-increasing volume of warehouses, shelves, racking, paper, trucks, and…safety ladders. And this leads us to a snapshot of one of the key roles of a publisher in any era: negotiating with suppliers and figuring out material flow logistics.
We organize our warehouses so that the most popular books are on the floor for easiest access. As books get older and less popular, they are placed higher and higher in the stacks, until they require a ladder to retrieve.
During the pandemic supply chain crisis, we were at the mercy of material shortages and manufacturer delays. It took three times as long as usual to print a book. But it wasn’t just books. On October 18, 2022, we attempted to order four more safety ladders from Webstaurantstore. The estimated delivery date was “March 2023.”
“Wow,” I thought. “That is a long time to wait for four ladders. But we need ’em.”
We placed an order for shelving parts at the same time. Another $2,324.99 of your hard-earned money was spent on more of our behind-the-scenes infrastructure.
We waited. On November 7, 2022we were surprised to receive a delivery from a company called Ballymore. We received no tracking information or advance warning that a delivery was coming, including no information about what was in the order. We were not given a Bill of Lading (the legal document that shows what is contained in a delivery), we weren’t told that this was part of our Webstaurantstore order, and the delivery driver did not even request the standard signature confirming delivery or allow time for us to inspect the boxes before he left. Upon opening the four boxes on the pallet, they proved to each contain one out of four pieces of a single ladder, which needed to be assembled. And we’ll never forget that, because assembly seemed to take all day.
Due to the lack of communication or notices, we were baffled. “Weird. I guess materials are in such short supply that they are going to send these one at a time?” I thought. Honestly, I didn’t think much of it—we frequently receive items from a single order in multiple shipments over a period of time. Our online Webstaurant store order was not marked as complete, so we assumed that the other three ladders were coming in March 2023, as quoted.
We had still not received the remaining three ladders when we were scheduled to on March 21, 2023, so we followed up with the Webstaurantstore. Instead, we were told that it was too late to notify them of a shortage, since it was more than 5 days since the delivery of the single ladder. They updated our shipping status to “delivered.” We argued that it was less than five days since the items were expected to be delivered. They told us that their records showed that we had received four ladders, none of which should have required assembly and insisted that three ladders were lost in our warehouse. “Look around and you’ll find them” was their solution. It was as insulting as it was baffling, as if we would contact them before “looking around” and had somehow managed to misplace three seven-foot ladders. They said there was nothing that we could do.
When it became clear that Webstaurantstore’s claims were illegitimate and they were not going to send us the ladders that we had paid for, we filed charges with Mastercard on March 28, 2023 because the merchant was not interested in resolving the matter. On April 4, 2023 Mastercard attempted to close the case in our favor but Webstaurantstore persisted.
On May 15, 2023, Webstaurantstore responded to the complaint but did not send sufficient documentation to dispute the refund. Then a week later, on May 23, 2023, our claim with Mastercard was denied, as, in the words of the Mastercard rep, “Usually a merchant does not go this far or provide this much paperwork…unless their ability to accept Mastercards due to a volume of disputes is being threatened.”
How did they do it? Webstaurantstore falsely asserted that we had signed for the shipment and they “found” the bill of lading that had disappeared. Suddenly, they had “proof” of shipment to provide and claimed that we had waited past Mastercard’s 90-day window after delivery. They sent shipping proof for the single ladder as “four pieces,” claiming it was four ladders. They adjusted facts and timelines as was convenient for their argument. They argued that the estimated delivery timeline and lack of communication were irrelevant, so the 90-day window would be calculated from the date of the original order in October. They tried to claim that the unsigned bill of lading was a legal document “proving” delivery. If it was, we had no way of knowing what was allegedly contained in this delivery because it had never been provided to us.
On June 1, 2023 we filed a second dispute with Mastercard, citing that 90 days had not passed since the delivery window, the shipment in question did not contain all of the items that we ordered, there was no communication provided to us that Webstaurantstore believed the transaction was complete, and the bill of lading was never signed or delivered, so we had no way of inspecting it for damage or shortage, as is customary and the purpose of these documents.
On June 29, 2023 Webstaurantstore again asserted to Mastercard that we do not have charge dispute rights through, as the Mastercard representative put it “Barraging us with a sheer volume of information and paperwork.” but again falsely claiming that the 90-day dispute window after delivery had already passed when first the dispute was filed. This time, Webstaurantstore went so far as to claim that the date when we placed our preorder was actually the date that the items had shipped.
We looked for other ways to resolve the situation. And this is where things became much more insidious. Since Webstaurantstore is based at 2205 Old Philadelphia Pike Lancaster, PA 17602, we filed a complaint both with the Better Business Bureau (BBB) and the Pennsylvania attorney general. Both organizations seem strangely powerless and act more like dispute mediators than having any authority over a private business (“participation in the Bureau’s mediation process is voluntary for both sides, and we cannot compel a business to agree to a solution.”) that apparently does billions of dollars in annual revenue for the state.
BBB suggested filing notices with the Attorney General’s Office Bureau of Consumer Protection in both Ohio (where they were delivered) and Oregon (where we are based), but these organizations disagreed that this was appropriate. So we explained Webstaurantstore’s deceit to Mastercard once more, who agreed that they were obfuscating the facts and attempted to try again.
We repeatedly called the Webstaurantstore customer service number, (717) 392-7472, thinking that if this company is as legit as they claim, they would understand that a perfect storm of events had gone wrong and resolve it. Instead, we were issued a concerningly lengthy claim number, 20231100079631, which would indicate that we are close to their 80 thousandth case of not delivering what someone paid for (or if you ignore what is likely a date, more amusingly, their 20 trillionth). Indeed, each customer service person variously implied that we were confused or lying. Perhaps this “perfect storm” was a feature, not a bug?
Webstaurantstore does not appear to have the ability to be reviewed on Google, but does have a fraudulent page of glowing “google reviews” that they maintain themselves. Clever, misleading, and somewhat baffling.
While the Pennsylvania Attorney General said “you are free to pursue a lawsuit privately,” it turns out that this isn’t entirely true. You see, Webstaurantstore has a particularly shocking “Terms of Service” document:
“You agree that any disputes and claims related to or arising from these Conditions of Use and/or your use of this website, including disputes arising from or concerning their interpretation, violation, invalidity, non-performance, or termination, will be resolved through final and binding arbitration under the Rules of Arbitration of the American Arbitration Association applying the laws of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, instead of in court. An exception is that you may assert claims in small claims court, if your claims qualify. To begin an arbitration proceeding, you must file a Demand for Arbitration with the AAA, according to the AAA’s rules. Payment of all filing, administration, and arbitrator fees will be governed by the AAA’s rules. We will reimburse those fees for claims totaling less than $10,000 unless the arbitrator determines the claims are frivolous. Likewise, WebstaurantStore will not seek attorneys’ fees and costs in arbitration unless the arbitrator determines the claims are frivolous. You may choose to have the arbitration conducted by telephone, based on written submissions, or in person in the county where you live or at another mutually agreed location.”
This sounds reasonable until you learn that the AAA arbitration fees would cost us a total of $1,725, for a dispute of items costing $1,142.59. It appears that these policies are intentional. Particularly after we learned about the multitude of lawsuits that Webstaurantstore receives from its own employees about alleged illegal labor practices, or as one former employee filed in a lawsuit, they “have not been provided real access to arbitration.” This was very concerning, as is the principle of the matter and our commitment to preventing this from happening to others.
Despite the fact that we did not sign a contract, this is significantly more expensive than a lawsuit costs to file. Fortunately, their terms of service are probably not legally enforceable.
Since we were not made aware that Webstaurantstore erroneously claimed that the order was delivered in full and they did not communicate this fact to us, we remain incapable of fulfilling and agreeing to the terms of sale. Hence, we were not able to notify Webstaurantstore about the delivery shortage within their timeframe because they changed the delivery time frame of the delivery without notifying us of this change.
Who was this Webstaurantstore? It appears that their game is controlling the SEO around all restaurant equipment, and they are great at this aspect of their job:
A friend pointed out the obvious: Microcosm has great SEO so the area where we could best protect potential future customers is through adding this story to their search results. We simply wanted the items that we paid for or a refund. Instead, nearly two years later, we’ve sunk hours into efforts at basic customer service interactions.
We’re still weighing our next steps. We have either until October 2025 or March 2026 (depending on Webstaurantstore’s obfuscations) to escalate the dispute legally. You might be thinking at this point, “Wow, Microcosm is really obsessed with this ladder thing, maybe they should move on.” Are the time and expense worth it to us? Maybe. Definitely not in terms of money—any legal settlement would need to be much larger than the bilking of the ladders in order to cover the time and costs we’ve already sunk into this issue. We could just let this go—we’re large enough at this point that the loss of three expensive ladders won’t sink us. But even just five years ago, it would have seriously compromised our ability to make payroll and we wouldn’t have been able to do a thing about it. We know we’re not the only people who’ve incurred losses by dealing in good faith with this company. We don’t have limitless resources, but it still seems worthwhile to use some of them to try to hold accountable a giant company that does twice our annual revenue every day but won’t make it right when they mess up.
As book publishers, we all know what it’s like to struggle in the shadow of a giant online retailer that plays dirty and seems to relish endless growth at the expense of everyone else in its ecosystem, including its customers. When people ask us what our day to day job is like, they don’t imagine a years-long dispute over ladders, but what else is there? A ladder helps us safely and quickly get you the obscure book you took a chance on, it helps us protect our workers and our colleagues, it helps us always reach higher.
Post Script: Within 24 hours we heard from numerous businesses who experienced the same phenomenon when attempting to order from Webstaurantstore; one of which went out of business afterwards.
