Why can’t I make money with a POD Publisher?
Why can’t I make money with a POD Publisher? I thought it was appropriate that I write the answer to this on April 1 because this industry represents one of the largest April fool’s joke on the Internet. As potentially successful as the POD publisher’s salesperson or website makes it appear, the numbers just don’t add up.
When you are published by a traditional publisher, you earn royalties and the publishers earn profits. When you self publish a book you earn both the royalty and the profit because you are paying all the expenses associated with publishing the book. When you pay a POD Publisher to publish your book, you are back to earning a royalty and the POD Publisher earns the profits. And here lies the problem.
When you are a traditionally published author you work for a royalty. Everyone knows this. If you are lucky you get a nice advance before the book is even published. The publisher, on the other hand works for a profit. Profits are what is left after paying all the costs associated with publishing, such as editing, layout & design, printing, storage and fulfillment, distributors fees as well as other sales and marketing expenses and, of course, royalties. The author’s royalty is not a particularly high percentage of the sale because the publisher is putting up all the money and taking most of the risks so they rightfully expect to make the lion’s share of the profits.
When a person decides to truly self publish their book they become the author and the publisher. As such, they earn the royalty and the profit. The royalty because they wrote the book and the profit because they are outlaying all the money and taking all the chances. High risk, high reward, low risk, low reward.
This is not the case when the author pays a POD Publisher or other subsidy or vanity publisher to publish their book. With the POD/Subsidy/Vanity Publisher, the author is back to working for a royalty as they would be if they were traditionally published. The difference, though, is that the author is also paying all the expenses associated with the publishing of the book but receives none of the profit. The profit is reserved for the POD/Subsidy/Vanity Publisher. Yes the royalties are higher than one would expect to earn from a traditional publisher but it hardly offsets the amount of money spent by the author getting their book to press through one of these publishers. Does that sound fair? Evidently it does to tens of thousands of authors who pay to be published by one of these publishers every year. Is that the truth or is it that they just don’t understand? I’d prefer to believe the latter.
What exactly do you get from a POD Publisher? I won’t choose any one publisher in particular because they all operate more or less the same way. You pay some sort of fee up front. This gets you the use of one of the publisher’s ISBN’s. You do not own this ISBN, no matter what you are led to believe and it is not transferable. It’s just like you putting my checking account number on your bank deposit slips. You will also get your text laid out in a book format ready for printing as well as a cover designed. With only one exception that I know of, you do not own this text layout or cover design, the publisher does. You think you have paid for it, but you haven’t, according to the publisher. So at this point of the game, you have put up a varying sum of money and own nothing.
Most POD Publishers have started to offer editing services. This, of course, is at an additional cost. Some even have excellent editorial services but this is a cost that would have been paid by the traditional publisher where you also earn a royalty.
Your book is now ready for press except it does not go to press. “Demand driven”, are the words they use. A traditional or self publisher prints books. If you are even slightly serious about publishing you need books. There us a good reason for this. Cost. The amazing new POD printing technology is expensive. At cost, a digitally printed 256 page book is going to cost $5/book and that price does not go down no matter how many copies are sold. A traditionally published or self published\ print run of 2000 books will cost $2/book and that unit cost continues to drop as more books are printed. This leaves a difference of $3/book and again, that’s at cost. The POD publisher is not going to let you buy books at cost. Remember, they make the profit, not you. You are more than likely looking at buying copies of that book at $9/book, $3/book higher than if you had printed them yourself as a self publisher.
Now here comes the real trick. Even the most industry naïve author has picked up on the talking point that the author has to sell their book. Success depends of how much the author gets out, creates buzz and markets his/her book. This is absolutely the truth. This is true whether the book is published traditionally, self published or published by one of the pay to be published publishers. I just recently read that Frank McCourt, author of Angela’s Ashes still spends six months of the year promoting books. The difference here though is who picks up the costs associated with this marketing. If you are traditionally published, the publisher picks up the costs associated with advertising, promoting and marketing the book. The author puts in tons of time but the publisher takes care of the monetary aspects. As a self publisher, you will put in the time as the author as well as the money as the publisher but remember, you are not only making the royalty, you are also making the profit.
With the POD Publisher the author will also pay for all the marketing and promotion, like the Self-Publisher but the money to do this comes out of your royalty, not the POD publishers profits. Not only does it not come out of their pocket, they make a substantial profit on each of these programs by selling them to you. Do you think any POD Publisher would sell an ad in the Sunday New York Times if their payment for this ad came from the sale of books sold? ABSOLUTLY NOT! They are getting it from both ends. They are earning the profit on the ad they sold you as well as the profit on the few, if any books sold as a result of the ad. Pretty good deal, huh? Why do you think there are so many POD Publishers out there now and more and more popping up every day?
As I wrote a few months back, you need to look at these publishers as printing services or publishing services, not publishers. If you need help publishing your book, hire a service like www.selfpublishing.com. Analyze pricing between the various services and make sure you are doing an apples to apples comparisons. Then make your choice based on facts. Watch out for “strings”. Whatever you do you want everything to be portable should you decide to move. If you are paying to publish your book, you should be earning profit as well as paying yourself a royalty.
One last item; don’t be fooled by the “We get you into 26,000 retailers and wholesalers”. This is the left hook of the POD Publishing industry. It sounds great and really makes it look like these publishers are doing something wonderful for you that you couldn’t do yourself as if it were some magical service. None of these places do anything other then enter your book in the Ingram database. Pretty much all the POD Publishers use Lightning Source, a digital printer in Tennessee. Lightning is owned by Ingram. Inclusion in the Ingram database makes your book available in many wholesale and retail outlets like Amazon and BN.com.. You can tell if a book has been printed by Lightning by the oddly placed barcode on the last page of the book. It’s a great little service but it’s not magic and it’s certainly not the self publishing Holy Grail. It is also not something you can’t accomplish yourself for a lot less money. If you don’t want to deal direct, you can always signup for about $50 through an online publishing service like SelfPublishing.com or you can deal directly with Lightning for a couple hundred dollars. Just keep in mind, while POD distribution might work OK as an entry level or supplemental distribution system, it is meant to be outgrown. Except in rare circumstances it should not be your sole means of distribution do to the cost issues mentioned above. Do the math and see you next month.
Last 5 posts by Ron Pramschufer
- What do you think about Amazon’s announcement that small publishers need to print with their printer in order to be listed on Amazon? - April 17th, 2008
- What are the steps are involved in Self-Publishing a book? - March 24th, 2008
- Do you know any good book printers? - February 11th, 2008
- What do you think of Facebook as a marketing tool for self-published books? - December 5th, 2007
- Did you change your mind about authors buying a single ISBN? - October 22nd, 2007
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April 3rd, 2006 at 2:23 pm
I’ve self-published three books using POD and have made money with two of them, and not lost money on the third. One of my books has sold 30,000 copies.
But Ron Pramschufer is exactly right in his article. A POD publisher is not cost effective.
This is not a paradox. I don’t use a POD publisher, I use a POD printer; I’M the publisher. My POD printer is very fast, does an excellent job and the cost of my books is way below what a POD publisher charges. In addition, when I receive a large order, my POD printer has arrangements with offset printers, and the price drops even further. In either case, I don’t buy books until I have an order for them.
The promise of Print-On-Demand is being fulfilled if you can get past all the POD publishers and find a good POD printer.
— Rick Lawler, author, editor and publisher of Owner to Owner: Guide to WorldMark Ownership, 30,000 copies sold to date.
Editor Note: Rick, I hope that sometime during the sale of 30,000 copies you also printed offset copies. Offset and POD can work hand and hand, although with those kind of sales, you shouldn’t have had a problem getting a traditional distributor who owuld get you into those same POD marketing channels but with you supplying books that cost you a fraction of the cost for POD printing.
April 3rd, 2006 at 3:34 pm
I am a little concerned about Ron’s insistence on the use of the term “POD publisher”. This is the kind of shorthand that has caused considerable damage to those of us who run our own publishing companies, but use the POD process to produce our books.
When POD came along in the late 1990’s, the process was quickly appropriated by any number of ‘publishers’, all of whom did more or less the same thing. They opened accounts with LightningSource, bought a bunch of ISBN numbers, hired some (at the beginning) relatively untalented cover designers, and learned some finer points of Adobe Acrobat.
These ‘publishers’ while they used the POD printing process, were not POD Publishers. They were - and remain - technologically advanced vanity presses.
Many of us out here in small-press land discovered that these houses (you know, the ones whose names begin with ‘i’ and ‘X’, among others) didn’t do anything for us that we couldn’t do for ourselves. So, we bought our own ISBN numbers, our own copies of Adobe Acrobat, set up our own accounts at Lightning Source, and started putting out our own books.
Some of us, like myself, became rather successful at it (two Private Eye Writers of America Shamus Award nominations). We even discovered that, by offering decent discounts and accepting returns, we could get stocked at the Big Box brick and mortar booksellers. We even found out that we could make a buck or two.
In my opinion, those of us out here privateering and using the POD technology to produce our books under our own imprints are the TRUE POD publishers.
The problem with tarring the mega-vanities with the term ‘POD publisher’ is that this is the exact misnomer that kept legitimate small presses using the POD process out of bookstores for years. Because the mega-vanities offered lousy discounts, did not accept returns, and did little or no promotion, the booksellers - especially the Big Box brick and mortars - largely ignored them at first. Later, they refused to accept ANY book produced using the POD process, because of the misconception (often fostered by the use of such terms as ‘POD publishers’) that all POD books were non-returnable and sold at ridiculously low discounts.
Guys, a vanity is a vanity is a vanity, no matter what kind of process it uses to print books. Offset printing is great, if you’re putting out mass market paperbacks. In reality, however, it is the rare independent press - at least in the fiction field - that is going to sell 2000 copies of any given title. It makes better sense to move up from a 4″x7″ mass market pb to a 5″x8″ trade paper paperback, save your upfront printing and setup costs, and put your money into promotions. There is a huge difference, however, between owning your product and paying someone else to use their ISBNs and produce your product.
Please, Ron, in the future I would really appreciate it if you’d refer to the objects of your article by their real term, high-tech vanity presses.
Richard Helms
Barbadoes Hall Communications
Back Alley Books
Editor Note: agree that POD is a printing process. I have written about the subject numerous times before. The problem is that the modern day Vanity Presses have hijacked the term and have become known as POD Publishers. I have written on dozens of occasions that these publishes are simply vanity presses with a new name. The problem is that the PR machines at these variouswell financed publishers have the media convinced that POD is a revolutionary new publishing method, not simply digital printing on an “as needed” basis. There are tens of thousands of authors out there trying to publish their first book who have bought into this idea. It is this group of people that I am trying to reach.
April 3rd, 2006 at 4:22 pm
I made the mistake of approaching “Authorhouse” which was suggested to me by a friend.
What may I do to get away from under the “Authorhouse” contract?
Thanks
Editor Note: I don’t believe that the Author House contract blocks you from moving on and self-publishing your book yourself. Just keep in mind that you do not own anything that they have done for you so far, like the ISBN and the printing file for the text and cover.
April 3rd, 2006 at 7:51 pm
Thanks for an expert article that I can point others to. I have run into so many people who have had their hearts broken and their wallets emptied by the vanities, and in the days before POD technology, ended up with cases of books that they couldn’t even give away. It wouldn’t be so bad if the vanities were honest about your chances of success, but they always point out the exceptional cases and shush over the vast majority of failures.
April 3rd, 2006 at 8:15 pm
Both Ron Pramschuffer and Richard Helms make salient yet self serving points of view in the Vanity vs POD publishing argument yet like the sex industry the POD industry wouldn’t be doing so well if there were not people out there keen to climb aboard.
Many wardrobe writers have realized for less than a couple of thousand bucks outlay authors can get their write stuff into print. Regardless of the hype that availability caters to people’s vanity so ’self’ publishers are springing up to harvest the boom. Very few realists expect to recover their outlays by internet sales but like romance hope springs eternal.
I don’t think the majority of these authors want anything more than stoking up their own egos by getting their creations into print
… their own fifteen minutes in the sunlight of their own making.
However some POD publishers/printers are less than honest and take advantage of these people’s naivety to exploit them. The internet can be a dangerous world with avaricious companies posing as reputable outfits lurking within its depths ready to gobble up the unwary, so authors like a minnow in a sea of barracuda, stay close to the shore and don’t get out of your depths while you carefully check out the bona fides of each and every one ot them before parting with your money.
Here endth the lesson.
Howard J Powers WA Australia
author of ‘The Devil In Lucia’ (not yet in print while waiting to find a straight shooting POD printer)
April 4th, 2006 at 12:43 am
I believe you’re right Ron as I’ve had experience with both types of publishers. Some want over a thousand dollars to publish but it’s just the printing they do then they have add ons for another eight hundred they’ll market it in some paper etc. then there’s another add on for something else and it keeps going on like that which drains your bank account if you have one I have a manuscript (The Ghost Visits Boot Hill) that’s not published yet and I’m writing a sequel to it but I don’t know how I want to get it published yet.
April 4th, 2006 at 10:16 am
POD Publishers should more accurately be referred to as Self-Publishing Service Providers. They perform a service for a fee. Using them is no more or less vain than self-publishing a book via off-set printing. When I want a hamburger, I have two choices. 1) Go hunt down a cow, kill it, skin it, grill it, and slap it on a bun. Or 2) Go to a restaurant and order one. I pay for the convenience of having someone else kill my cow for me. PODs (Self-Publishing Service Providers) are not doing anything authors can’t do themselves with a lot of time, effort, and expense. They simply make self-publishing more convenient. That convenience has a price, just like it does when you go out to eat at a restaurant. The problems arise when writers try to cram the on-demand publishing model into traditional or off-set business practices. That is like cramming a round peg into a square hole. You might squeeze it in there, but it is always going to be a little off. Writers who recognize the difference, and cater their business plans toward the advantages inherent in on-demand (lower trade discounts and EDI distribution), can make money with on-demand projects that simply would not work the old-fashioned way. Publishing via any route is a gamble. Traditional publishers gamble hundreds of thousands of dollars and the success rate is low. Self-publishing writers gamble tens of thousands of dollars and the success rate is low. POD writers gamble hundreds of dollars and the success rate is low. Since the odds are the same, I know which gamble I would be willing to make.
Editor Note: Nice analogy. I haven’t killed any cows to get meat but I have bought ground beef and made burgers on the grill. I have also ordered a burger at a restaurant. The problem comes if you try to sell me the ground beef for the restaurant price and I still have to cook it on the grill. This is what I see going on out there in the POD Publishing world. As for your new term of “self publishing service provider”, if the author is using your ISBN, you are the “publisher”, period. If you have people buy their own ISBN’s from RR Bokker, then you would be a “self-publishing service provider. Which are you?
April 5th, 2006 at 7:01 am
Hi everyone!
I find this whole discussion fascinating and erlightening!
But, I am a newby to publisjing. I have written a very good system for quitting smoking, and this book needs to be published. But, when I read all thats writem here, I ask the question…umm, ok, so what are these guys suggesting a guy like me do?
It is hard for me to distinguish readily which company is in which publishing type.
Where do I go? What do I say? What do I do?
So far, Ron seems like a ood knowledgable guy, that can tell me what not to do. But, what do i do, and how much money and time will it take?
The best company I have found that “might” work with me is Publish America, but the guy that I know that is published there said next time, he will go to a different place. But, I don’t know why, and if its relevant to me, a newby. Is Publish America a real publisher? If not, what are they? Should I try them?
I know you need the book to be written well, and edited well, and a good cover, abd isbn numbers, and copyrites, and releases for any statements in the book by others. It also needs to be printed, distributed, and advertised. What am I leaving out”?
Maybe someone can email me who to talk to and where to go?
I don’t mind doing most all of these chores, as long as it all makes sense as a whole. I talked to A- House before, but, they seemed less interested in the process and more interested in me paying them, so, I didn’t bite.
I want to know how to get the book created in the cheapest and best fashion. I want to know how to get the book on the best companies inventory, like Amazon, Lightening Source, Baranes and Noble and others.
Can someone break this down one more leverl for me? I need a “Here is what we are suggesting that you do, statement.
Thanks
Don Muller
http://quitsmokingmuscles.com
quitsmokingmuscles@yahoo.com
Editor Note:
Your situation is pretty typical. After all your research you are talking about Publishing America who just happens to be one of the most complained about, deceptive publisher out there. You might want to listen to an interview I did with Jenna Glazter, head of a writers group with over 70,000 members, for my Publishing Basics Radio PodCast. You can listen to, or download the interview or transcript by going to http://www.wbjbradio.com/viewshow.php?id=42&aid=
Meanwhile, you should get a copy of the 3rd Edition of Publishing Basics (link below article). It will help clear up most of your questions.
April 6th, 2006 at 1:31 pm
Good article, Ron; thanks! I’ve done the research and come to pretty much the same conclusion.
One point in your article I would quibble with.is this one:
“If you are traditionally published, the publisher picks up the costs associated with advertising, promoting and marketing the book. The author puts in tons of time but the publisher takes care of the monetary aspects.”
My experience (with 3 books) has been that the publisher picked up the tab for a small promotional push when the book first came out (a few magazine ads, posters for books shows, submission to catalogs, trade journals, etc). But that was it. The rest of it was on me.If I wanted any more promotion done the money came out of my pocket. This has been the experience of some of my author friends, as well, and I’ve often wondered how many other authors have had similar experiences.
At this point, I’ve had it with the cheating ways of traditional publishers, and am looking to go another route. POD looked good at first, but over the years I’ve watched the cost go up and the royalty rate go down. I figured I’d be better off dealing directly with Lightning Source than go through one of these guys, so that’s what I may do next time.
Thanks again for the good article,
Margie
April 6th, 2006 at 2:19 pm
I agree with Richard Helms. I started my publishing company in 1998 with “traditional” press runs. We had a distributor who went under, not paying us a nice chunk of money, so we decided to go with Lightning Source (Lightning Print at the time) with a few of our new titles. Although sales were less than with “traditional” press runs, we became profitable almost immediately. POD should be only a printing option, not a Scarlet Letter slapped on all of us because of a few major Vanity Presses who also happen to use POD. We still produce books with press runs of 2000+ but also use POD on titles we feel are not ready for larger press runs. If we get large orders, we shift that to offset. We need to fight the urge to lump all publishers into the POD Publisher category.
April 6th, 2006 at 4:49 pm
The article(s) have been most helpful; verbalized and confirmed my suspictioons. I’ve been in contact with 15 vanity presses, paid no money, will not pay them and have decided to get a printer. After I have the books I plan to start with Amazon.com and take it from there. Author and Publisher of the novel, “The Naturopath”.
April 7th, 2006 at 6:53 am
Great article, Ron. While POD has its place, I’ve always steered my author clients away from it. It’s really for the person who just wants a book with their name on it.
BTW- Your readers can get a free copy of a little ebook I wrote titled, “Ten Key Questions authors Need to Answer About Their Book” It helps people become clear about their goals and direction. At http://www.TheBookCoach.com
April 10th, 2006 at 9:18 am
You are tackling two entirely different topics here. Print on Demand is how we now print all of our books. We contract with a printer to provide books in a specific quantity whenever we need to order. Sometimes this is one or two books, sometimes 100 (as when we need to send out galley copies). Subsidy or vanity publishing is an entirely different horse.
My POD printer provides me with any number of books at a relatively good price. For my last book, I paid about $2.50 per book. To print 1,000 copies, the lowest quote I had from web or sheet printers was $1.88 per book. This meant that I had to tie up $1,880 (plus shipping costs) of my money in books that had to be sold to get any return whatsoever. The additional expense of $.62 per book is not significant, and in fact was well below our highest estimate for offset printing, which was $4.40 per book. I am VERY happy to have to send only a check for a few dollars when I need a few more books from my POD printer.
We looked at Lightning Source and other so-called POD printers but did not find them cost effective. They are actually vanity/subsidy publishers and your article is correct about their business model.
Our printer is NOT a vanity publisher. He does not supply ISBN numbers or do anything else that a publisher would do - he just prints books.
We have had a lot of confused new publishers in our publishing trade group locally who are confused about these two separate topics. It does not help when someone lumps POD in with vanity and subsidy issues. There IS a distinction.
April 14th, 2006 at 11:38 am
I tried many big name publishers and have the rejection slips to proove it. I read carefully about the Vanity Press types and figured out their profit motive at my expense.
I then figured if I wasn’t willing to invest my money into my own book, why would I expect anyone else to do so.
Through a friend at church, who is an editor, I contacted a printing company whoo prints books for such unknowns like myself.
My job was to design the cover and illustrations, set up the entire book from cover to back cover. I did all this and have been able to pay for two printings with very slow sales because I cannot see how I can write another book and do all the heavy marketing myself on the first one. However, my greatest reward is that I have made some people very happy and received many compliments on the story that touched their hearts and enriched their lives. That to me is the best profit of all.
April 16th, 2006 at 10:13 am
This is so-o- fasinating.
I teach a workshop in London, Ontario on how to prepare your manuscript for publishing -either self-publishing or main-stream publishing.
The editor is 100% correct!!!
I have done a lot of research and POD does own the ISBN-even if they say they don’t.
I can not understand why writers (notice I did not use the phrase-authors) go to these POD’s.
You pay twice for your product. First, you pay for them to organize everything for you ( which you could do yourself) and then when your books are printed if you want to sell any you have to buy them.
Aren’t you paying twice?
I f a person is smart enough to write a book I know they are smart enough to get it published and printed thenmselves. We just need to take the time to do our research!!
As far as getting it edited most POD books are poorly done. So many mistakes in the majority of them.
If self-publishers want to reap the benefits make sure it is properly edited. It might cost you but in the long run it will help you.
As for selling - POD’s -you have to figure a price increase between 21/2 or 3 times the cost of the book.
I have seen some books retail at $35.00 and I know they aren’t worth that.
If you ever go to a book trade show did you ever notice how many books big publishing companies give away?
Makes you think!!!
So for those of us who are small self-publishers the profits on a book are ours.
We have to work hard-yes but the benefits are so-o- rewarding.
Those of us who self-publish have to change the look we sometimes encounter(the book is not great look) so it is important to take our time and do our homework and do our books professionally and not take the easy way out!!!
Thank you for this wonderful web site.
Pauline
http://www.childrenswritingworkshop.com
April 20th, 2006 at 4:00 pm
[…] Publishing Basics: Why can’t I make money with a POD Publisher? “Why can’t I make money with a POD Publisher? I thought it was appropriate that I write the answer to this on April 1 because this industry represents one of the largest April fool’s joke on the Internet. As potentially successful as the POD publisher’s salesperson or website makes it appear, the numbers just don’t add up.” […]
April 23rd, 2006 at 4:29 pm
Great discussion about POD. I went POD with my personal protection book: One Less Victim. Over the past year, I found that I can do almost everything that the POD does. A little research and effort can save a writer/self-publisher thousands of dollars and frustration. I donated a story to one of Jenna Glazter’s projects (Stories of Strength) and it moved very fast. She did everything that she claimed. I did NOT find that kind of action with the POD.
April 25th, 2006 at 6:58 pm
Through this entire discussion I have not read the companies to consider a POD. I have self published already and considering iuniverse from Barnes and noble. I do realize my success depends on me, so I am just looking for the best vehicle for the success I am looking to achieve. So if some could give some insight.
May 6th, 2006 at 4:55 pm
When my husband decided to self-publish his book he figured that he could also help others get published and decided to become a small, independent publisher. Since we were overseas in a foreign country that used firewalls on most Internet sites, we were unaware of how negative reports on publishers who used the POD technology. Upon returning home to launch the business, we began to learn more and more the bias against POD users and the difficulty of creating a traditional publishing model while using POD technology. After six years we are still not profitable because we are working to be different from the majority of POD publishers as you call them. Our naivete and ignorance about the book production business is perhaps a large part of our difficulty. Perhaps we may be forunate in that we have not been spoiled, so to speak, by all the industry hype and biases.
As a small publisher we have worked to gain recognition as such and not as a vanity publisher. It seems that as soon as one hears POD, one assumes that the publisher is a vanity publisher. From the very beginning of starting this publshing business, we decided that editing and working with our authors to imropove their writing was important. Unfortunately, we did not have huge capital or large business loans to help us begin the business. We are truly a grassroots, basement operation. Some of our authors have compalined about having to edit their book more than once or twice. Others have taken the time to improve their writing and have taken the advice of a good editor to do this. We have rejected an author’s work because we felt the writing needed vast improvement. Yes, we have also publsihed books that were edited to some extent but not to the level we expected, yet was not so bad that it couldn’t be published. In these instances we published the book to help the author understand what we mean when it doesn’t sell.
It is not possible for small publishers using POD technology to compete with the big publishing houses, or larger POD publishers who publish several hundred books a year. There are those of us who do not use the vanity model, or for profit model. There are some of us who are publishers because we feel that those people who want to write should not have to find it difficult to publish their book. Traditional publishing houses generally accept only 5% of the manuscripts they receive. They reject anything that they don’t think will be profitable or will be marketable. They have the funds to take that risk and the editors to rework an author’s writing so that when the author sees it again, it is hardly what he wrote. Vanity publishing is a printing service which offers a custom cover and a book format—no matter what the file looks like or contains they print it. Many authors who do not want their ideas changed look to this kind of publishing because they want others to read what they wrote because that writer thinks what he has written is important for others to read.
Even traditional publishers own the ISBN, don’t they? I think it is sad that some legitimate and honest publishers who use POD technology are put in the mix of vanity publishersmaking it very difficult to get other wholesalers, besides Ingram, to distribute their books.
At least POD books are now seen as available on bookstore computers instad of showing only one book or no books available. What you see as a disadvantage in POD is good sense to me. Why print 10000 books that may not sell just because the price per book is low? Imgaine stocking that many books and losing it to a hurricane or flooding, or even a fire? Print on demand means that their is no stock piling of books which saves on space whether in a warehouse or one’s basement. We print at leAst 10 books when the books are in production. The author orders what he needs. All our books are returnable because we aim to sell them or use them at book signings or book fairs or send to possible distributors.
I thnk people who have great influence in the publishing world need to say someething positive about the other small publsiher using POD technology and let others know that there are those who are not all out for profit.
Pat Holland
KiwE Publishing, Ltd.
July 9th, 2006 at 8:38 pm
I am a new writer/autor. I want to thank you for all the information that you put out so I can be enlightened. My friend recommended iUniverse. Without researching the company, except their website, I submitted my manuscript with them. I was not aware of POD publisher and POD printer..
It took me almost three years to write my first book. i designed the cover and did a lot of work myself. I thought that I was self-publishing my book and they just the in-between to get my book distributed. This is an experience that I will take with me next time I write my second book.
Thanks a million.
Ning Samson
A novice writer
December 7th, 2006 at 3:10 pm
I want to say that I agree with the way that we are being taken advantage of from POD assisted press companies. I am having a bad experience with one, however, since I’m almost ready for print, I will finish it out and then move on. The gift I received this past year is that I have gained a tremendous amount of knowledge from everyone concerned with this issue. I thank all of you. The only way to learn about the good, is I’ve learned about the bad. My book will be in print in the next few weeks. Then I will make adjustments to publish it in another avenue. I’ve also made a lot of friends around the world who love to write. Ron has offered a lot of info on this subject and I thank you. Stick together Authors. Thanks for sharing your wisdom.
Frederiko Aguilar. Author of “The Desert has no King”.
December 19th, 2006 at 9:10 pm
Wonderful articles by all the contributors. Is there any hope
for us whom have pod backgrounds.?l
December 20th, 2006 at 4:28 pm
Thanks for all of the postings. I’ve had the experience of traditional publishing, POD’s, and self-publishing (with inventory). All have good & bad points. And all have one thing in common: You must promote your book! The publisher won’t promote irt, the wholesaler won’t promote it, and the book won’t sell itself.
Good promotion will sell a sub-standard book. A lack of promotion won’t sell a very good book. Perhaps my website will help some of you.
Merry Christmas & Happy Holidays. May 2007 bring evryone the best!
Bill
December 29th, 2006 at 10:52 am
Your comments on self-publishing vs. \”POD\’s\” was enlightening. I have just published my first children\’s picture book with one those type companies. My purpose was to publish a book to honor a loved one who had passed. I am now involved in the marketing of this book. There are varying packages that are offered and I just hope that this company does what it says. Included are 500,000 emails. Please share with me if this is as good as it sounds to me, a novice. The company says that it is not spamming, but is marketing to outlets that have already agreed to receive the notifications.
If you let me know what ocmpany you are talking about, I can look into it. It\’s possible it\’s not spam but not probable.
Happy New Year
Thanks
Ron
March 1st, 2007 at 7:45 pm
Another author of a pod book which does not sell any where on the planet listed as being for sale every where . In Dec I had over 2 thousand free adds up for me you would think it would have sold at least one book no no book sales books are for sale used all over the Internet tried to link to a book seller they couldn’t link to me because they only got used copies of my book to sell no new ones from my publisher I don’t get paid for used copies . Want to publish again but don’t know how ?
March 8th, 2007 at 10:47 am
This is a great forum!!! One can agree with the comments of Ron and everybody in general. I am an author that self-published his 6 book titles since 1978. Obviously, I am not a financial expert, for I kept losing money. (Once I printed my own illustrated books by laser printer, but had to pay $20 + tax per copy only for the binding, a clear loss.) Large distributors do not like to deal with small publishers having a few titles. You need to have about 100 titles for that. An intriguing book, like the one about the fingerprints of the gods, can make a lots of money (although it tells me very little new since Eric v. Daniken or my own Atlantis book); 578 pages but by Doubleday. If you do such by POD yourself, you may lose your pants on it. Does not matter how great is your book if the world does not know about it. 98% of “real” (famous & not vanity) publishers do not accept unsolicited queries. My first “real” (royalty-paying) book is just in print, in English, by a large publisher in Germany: “Absolute dates for ancient China by astronomy.” After 3 decades of research, I can prove to the world that Defoe was only editor to the real autobiography of Robinson Crusoe, and identified his island in Central America, even the few Terraba words of Friday. Or, the exact location af a sunken island (Aztlan of the Mexicans) at the Bahamas. Or, the exact day of the Crucifixion. Or, a polyglot dictionary of 116 languages. Or, a revised chronology of Rome and Greece. In the days of the Communication Superhighway, you just cannot pass important info to the next generation before you die. [Our sciences are dominated by an extremist Darwinist group that claims the Bible as pure legend and fantasy; while the other extreme camp excommunicates you if you do not believe the creation in 6 working days… Nothing between, only rigid oppositions. You cannot find an independent publisher. So my next book, “Challenging the human sciences”, has no publisher yet, only POD printer (?), although you and millions of readers would buy it. I apologize for the discouragement. You will be doing better.