BOL.com - the Bertelsmann ecommerce venture created to rival the mighty Amazon - is to enter a new chapter of etailing in the UK.

From September, BOL in the UK will cease being an etailer and instead become a book club.

Next month it will concentrate on punting the top 200 bestsellers with discounts of up to 60 per cent.

Of course, to take advantage of the discounts consumers will have to sign up to the book club and pledge to buy a certain number of books a year.

Those behind the shift believe this is the first pure-play online book club - certainly in the UK.

Between 15 and 20 jobs are expected to be lost as part of the change. ®