Amazon Australia: ‘We’re very optimistic about the next five years’

In the lead-up to the 2025 Australian Book Industry Awards (ABIA), Books+Publishing is in conversation with the event’s major sponsors about the status of the industry, what excites them about the future, and what they have to offer publishers, booksellers and readers. Chloe Kim, head of books, Amazon Australia, spoke with the publication.

This segment is supported by the event sponsors. 

Tell us about your company. What do you most want booksellers and publishers to know about what you do?

At Amazon Australia Books, we are committed to connecting readers with a vast selection of books while providing booksellers and publishers with powerful tools and insights to reach more customers. We invest heavily in logistics, technology and customer experience to ensure books get to our customers quickly and reliably.

What’s your top piece of actionable advice for folks working in publishing and/or bookselling?

My top advice would be to embrace the growing ways to engage with readers and customers. Whether it’s using our Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) – a self-publishing program with the goal of helping authors find their audience – or our suite of online marketing and analytics tools for booksellers, leverage the power of technology to understand your readers and connect with them in new and innovative ways.

Tell us an interesting fact that book industry folks don’t know about your company.

Many people may not know that Amazon Australia established a local print-on-demand (POD) facility in Sydney in 2021. This state-of-the-art POD fulfillment center allows us to print paperback books on demand, enabling faster delivery of millions of titles to customers across Australia. By printing books locally, we’re cutting out the need for surplus inventory, benefiting both independent authors and publishers.

We’re also constantly expanding our range of Australian-authored titles and supporting local publishers and booksellers through various programs and initiatives. We just launched Novel Conversations – a new writers-on-writers video series spotlighting local talent. Our pilot episode sits down with Shankari Chandran and Ann Liang, who dive deep into their craft, careers and creative journeys.

With Australia being such a vast continent, is there anything you can share about how Amazon’s logistics might have been tested by its establishment here?

Fast and reliable delivery across a wide selection of products remains the cornerstone of our customer offering, and we are aiming to get faster. 2024 was our fastest year yet, thanks to the launch of same-day delivery for Prime members in Sydney in 2024 and the expansion of our next-day service – already available in Sydney and Melbourne – to 10 new locations across Australia, including Brisbane, Gold Coast, Sunshine Coast, Newcastle, Gosford, Blue Mountains, Wollongong, Canberra, Geelong and Mornington Peninsula.

This is all possible due to the significant investment in our expanded operations network, enabling a seamless, faster and more reliable shopping experience for customers. In fact, between January 2024 and 2026, Amazon Australia will have invested AU$1.6 billion opening five new operational sites. Since 2011, Amazon has invested more than AU$20 billion across our businesses in Australia and more than AU$5 billion in 2023 alone.

Thinking of the last few years in publishing and bookselling, what has excited or interested you the most?

I’ve been really excited to see the growth in Australian and New Zealand authors finding commercial success, both locally and globally. The diversity of voices and stories emerging from our region is incredible, including Charlotte Wood and Holly Ringland. I’m also interested to see how publishers and booksellers are adapting to meet evolving consumer preferences for digital reading formats like audiobooks and ebooks.

What do you think is the state of the book industry right now? If you could name one factor that most underpins this impression, what would it be?

The Australian book industry is in a dynamic and evolving state, balancing the resilience of physical books with the growing influence of digital discovery and online retail. The underpinning factor is the changing behaviours of customers across Australia. Readers increasingly rely on data-driven recommendations, social media influence and convenience-driven purchasing decisions, reshaping how books are discovered and sold. This is presenting an exciting opportunity for local talent. As readers increasingly engage online, we see opportunities to connect Australian authors, publishers and booksellers with readers both domestically and globally. By working in partnership with organisations (like the Australian Book Industry Awards) that deeply understand the unique strengths of the local market, we’re able to create new pathways for this rich literary community to reach and inspire readers in Australia and beyond.

If you could change one thing about the industry at a systemic level, what would it be?

I’d like to balance support for new release titles – we offer services like Release Day Delivery and Pre-order Price Guarantee – with concerted efforts to enable readers to discover and purchase all titles, including backlist titles. We believe in empowering readers to explore the full breadth of the industry’s offering, and believe we can extend the lifecycle of titles by improving access to all books. Our catalogue includes more than 33 million titles, including KDP authors, and it continues to grow every year.

What do you think the next five years hold for the book industry in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand?

We’re very optimistic about the next five years. I hope to hear more local voices and storytelling from Australia and New Zealand. We will be committed to helping the wider industry and future writers, giving them access to publishing opportunities, connecting with readers and celebrating their success on a local and global stage.

And a bonus (optional) question – what book from Australia or Aotearoa New Zealand have you most recently enjoyed?

I really enjoyed Memorial Days by Geraldine Brooks. This memoir is both devastating and deeply illuminating. With her signature precision and insight, Brooks captures the messy, nonlinear journey of mourning. It is heart-wrenching yet deeply human. Memorial Days is truly a masterful reflection on love, memory and the ways we carry those we’ve lost.

The Australian Book Industry Awards are presented for achievements in bringing Australian books to readers. This year marks the event’s 25th anniversary.

Books+Publishing is the Australian book sector’s number-one source for news, opinions, pre-publication reviews, jobs, and advertisements.

Category: ABIA