Draft2Digital has announced that self-publishers who use their service have a new distribution channel. The US company has ironed out a new agreement with Tolino, a German based online bookstore.
The Tolino Alliance was formed in 2013 and their mandate was to combat Amazon in Germany. This marked the first occasion that Thalia, Weltbild, Hugendubel, Club Bertelsmann, Deutsche Telekom all banded together to forge a series of e-reading devices and launch an online bookstore. Not only are books and readers sold all over Germany but recently they expanded to Belgium via Standaard Boekhandel.
It has been said that Tolino controls 42% of the German e-Book market, which is the third largest English-language e-Book market in the world. Draft2Digital currently has a catalog of 40,000+ books, which makes it a minor player in self-publishing.
Many American authors are pleased at the new distribution channel. In order to enroll your books there is a big red button that will add your titles to Tolino all at once, which makes things easier than doing it one by one.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.