Print on demand (POD) is the commonly-used term
for the digital printing
technology that allows a complete book to be printed and bound in
a matter of minutes. Digital printing makes it easy and cost-effective
to
produce
books one or two at a time or in small lots,
rather than in larger print runs of several hundred or several
thousand.
Digital printing has a number of applications. Commercial and academic
publishers
use it to print advance reading copies, or when they
can't justify the expense of producing and warehousing a sizeable print
run--for
instance, to keep backlist books available. Small
presses use it as a more economical fulfillment method, trading
minimal
startup costs against lower per-book profits (due to economies of
scale, digitally printed books have a higher unit production cost than
books
produced in large
runs on offset presses). Last but not least, there
are the print-on-demand self-publishing services, which offer a
fee-based
service that can be described, depending on one's bias, as
either vanity publishing or self-publishing.
What
is a Print-on-Demand Self-Publishing Service?
Print-on-demand self-publishing services (I'm
going to
call them POD services for short) utilize digital printing technology
to provide publishing services to writers. They range all the way from
bare-bones services like Lulu.com, which provides free online templates
that allow anyone to upload and format a book that can then be ordered
from the service's website, to super-fancy (and extremely expensive)
packages that include editing, custom cover design, enhanced marketing,
and other extras.
Most POD services charge a
fee, ranging anywhere from a few hundred to several
thousand
dollars (though as noted above, some offer a basic free package).
They don't typically screen submissions; if they do, it's usually only
to exclude pornography or
hate
literature. If you want editing, proofreading, custom design, or book
marketing, you will probably have to add these on to the basic
publishing package, at additional
cost. Though most POD services' contracts take only nonexclusive
digital and epublishing rights, the lion's share of a book's sales
price still goes to the service, to offset printing and production
costs. The author's income is in the form of a
royalty.
POD services do provide a form of self-publishing (some will
let you put the name of your
own imprint on your book, set your own cover prices, designate a
royalty percentage, etc.), but there are important differences
between a POD service
and true self-publishing:
- Control. With self-publishing,
the writer controls all
aspects of the publishing process, from
cover art to print style to pricing. With POD services, choice is
typically
limited to the package of services the publisher
offers.
- Revenue. With self-publishing, the writer keeps all
proceeds
from sales. With POD services, payment comes in the form of a royalty.
Basically, you're paying twice: once upfront, and
once
with each book produced and sold.
- Rights. With self-publishing, all rights
remain with the writer, who has full ownership of
his/her books, including the ISBN number. With most POD services, the
POD
service owns the ISBN, and has a claim on digital and/or electronic
publishing rights (even though that claim is usually limited and
nonexclusive).
In practice, POD services more closely
resemble vanity publishers--which
is how they're widely regarded by readers,
reviewers, and
booksellers.
Pros
and Cons
For writers who don't want to go through the
submission process
required by commercial publishers, or who aren't concerned about
commercial
potential, or who want to produce a family memoir or genealogy or
recipe book for private
distribution, a POD service can be an excellent option. The best of
them provide attractively-designed books at a far lower cost than
traditional self- or vanity publishing (although costs are steadily
rising, and some of the fancier POD packages are nearly
as expensive as old-style vanities), and offer
many of the same benefits, including guaranteed publication and the
absence of editorial interference. Also, since the
book is produced only when ordered, you don't risk winding up with a
garage full of unsold volumes.
POD services offer an opportunity to established authors seeking
to bring their out-of-print books back
into circulation. A number of POD services offer
programs specifically targeted to such authors, often in association
with professional writers' groups. The Authors' Guild, for instance,
has teamed with POD service iUniverse for its Back In Print program,
and the American Society of Journalists and Authors offers a similar
program via ASJA Press.
A POD service can also be a good option for niche nonfiction projects.
These can be a tough sell for
commercial or academic publishers, but they can do well for the
motivated
self-publisher who has a way of reaching his or her
audience, and is able to devote time and money to marketing and
promotion.
Writers who can exploit "back of the room" situations may
also do well with a POD service--someone who lectures or conducts
workshops, for instance, and can sell books at these occasions, or a
restauranteur who wants to make a cookbook available to his or her
customers.
If you're a new writer looking to establish a career, however, a POD
service is probably not a good choice, -except possibly as a fallback
option
for a manuscript that has failed to find a home. POD services' policies
on pricing, marketing, and distribution severely limit their books'
availability (see the Issues section, below),
and are likely to result
in tiny sales and readership, even for authors who diligently
self-promote (see the Sales
Statistics
section, below). It's unlikely that a book published by a POD service
will be considered a professional publishing credit, or that, as many
authors hope, it will provide a
stepping stone to commercial publication (according to a 2004 article
in the New York Times, out of the 10,000 or so titles
published to that time
by POD service Xlibris, only 20 had been picked up by
commercial publishers).
If you spend time on the Internet, you
will probably encounter people who are eager to dispute this. They'll
tell you that self-publishing is the way of the future. They'll claim
that the stigma
traditionally associated with self- and vanity publishing has all but
disappeared,
and that it's becoming ever more common for self-published books to be
acquired by bigger publishing houses. They'll often be able to point
you to a news story
about a writer who parlayed self-publishing into a lucrative commercial
contract.
But like the hype from self-publishing "evangelists," articles about
self-publishing success are often biased,
inaccurate, or overstated (see Writer
Beware's analysis of one recent example). And there's nothing new
about big publishers picking up self-published books that sell
robustly--just Google What Color Is Your Parachute? or The
Christmas Box. As for the self-publishing stigma--unfair though it
may be in many cases, it is alive and well. Check out this
extensive list of media responses to the question, "How do you feel
about self-published books?"
As noted above, self-publishing via a POD service can be an excellent
option for some writers and some projects. For others, it's not the
right choice. What's important is to know the facts and make an
informed decison. There are some suggestions for doing that below.
Sales
Statistics
The average book from a POD service sells fewer
than 200
copies, mostly to "pocket"
markets surrounding the author--friends, family, local retailers who
can be
persuaded to place an order--and to the author him/herself. According
to the chief executive of
POD service iUniverse, quoted
in the New York Times in 2004,
40%
of iUniverse's books are sold directly to authors.
POD services' own statistics support these
low sales figures. AuthorHouse's online Fact
Sheet reveals that it has signed up more than 40,000 authors, and
issued more than 60,000 titles.
According to a
January 2009 article in the New
York Times, AuthorHouse reports selling more than 2.5 million
books in 2008--which
sounds like a lot, but averages out to around 41 sales per title.
iUniverse's 2005 Facts and
Figures sheet, which Writer Beware has seen, reported that the company
published 22,265 titles
through the end of that year, with sales of 3.7 million: an average of
166 sales per
title. Obviously some titles can
boast better sales (Amy Fisher's If
I Knew Then sold over 32,000 copies)--but not many. According to
a 2004
article
in Publishers Weekly, only
83 of more than 18,000 iUniverse titles published during that year sold
at least 500 copies. And in a 2008
article in The New York Times,
iUniverse's VP, Susan Driscoll, admitted that most iUniverse authors
sell fewer than 200 books.
As of 2004, stats for Xlibris were similar. According
to a Wall
Street Journal article, 85%
of its books had sold fewer than 200 copies, and only around 3%--or 352
in all--had sold
more than 500 copies. Things looked up in 2007: according to Xlibris's
own internal reports, obtained by Writer Beware, 4% of its
titles had sold more than 1,000 copies. However, the averages still
aren't good. As of mid-2007, Xlibris had 23,000 authors and had
published 23,500 titles, with total sales of over 3 million--around 127
sales per title.
Once independent companies, AuthorHouse, iUniverse, Xlibris, and
Canada-based Trafford Publishing
are now all owned by Author Solutions Inc. In the January 2009 New York Times
article
referenced above, Kevin Weiss, Author Solutions' CEO, put the
average sales of titles from any of the company's brands at around 150.
Lulu.com, one of the most popular and cost-effective of the POD
services and still independent despite the apparent trend toward
consolidation among POD services, is explicit about its long tail
business model.
In a
2007 article,
its founder, Bob Young, identified the company's goal: "A publishing
house dreams of having 10 authors selling a million books each. Lulu
wants a million authors selling 100 books each." He also admits that
the average Lulu "print run" is fewer than 2 copies.
Issues
to Consider
In addition to the lack of sales and credibility
discussed above, there are
a number of issues to consider if you're thinking of using
a POD service.
- Booksellers don't like dealing with
POD services. Depending on who's doing the estimating, anywhere
from 10%-20%
of all new books are bought online. But the largest single source of
book sales
remains the brick-and-mortar bookstore. In order to
sell books in significant numbers, you need a balance of online and
offline presence.
Books from POD services are generally available through the service's
website, and from Amazon and other Internet booksellers. Most POD
services also list their books in the catalogue of a major
wholesaler such as Ingram, which ensures that they'll be available for
order at most bookstore in the US. But "available" doesn't mean
"stocked" (a fact that some of the more deceptive POD services do their
best to obscure). By long tradition, booksellers are accustomed
to a particular set of buying protocols--discounts of 40% or more, 60-
or 90-day billing, and full returnability. Many POD services don't
offer
industry-standard discounts, and most require that orders be pre-paid.
And while
some services do offer returnability if authors pay an extra fee,
it's usually a fairly restrictive policy that booksellers may not find
attractive. All these factors, together with the POD services'
reputation as vanity
publishers and the widespread prejudice against self-published books
(see above), make most booksellers reluctant to stock a book from a POD
service.
Authors who are willing to go door-to-door can be successful in
persuading local bookstores to stock their books (though
often they must sell on consignment, or agree to buy back unsold
copies). By and large, however, books from POD services, like ebooks,
are available mainly online.
- Books from POD services are expensive. POD services
base their pricing
on the amount of paper it takes to print the book. Some make an attempt
to hold prices down with flat or negotiable
rates, but in most cases your book will cost more--often a lot
more--than a similar book from a commercial
publisher. Readers may balk at paying $25 or $30 for a trade
paperback-size book, especially when its commercially-printed
counterpart costs around $16.
- Books from POD services may be of poor physical
quality.
POD-produced books can be almost indistinguishable from
traditionally-printed
trade paperbacks. But some POD services skimp on paper
and
cover stock, and don't pay enough attention to production standards.
Books from these companies can be shoddy in appearance, with
covers that curl and pages that fall out as you're reading them.
POD-produced
books are also often bound with a narrow spine, so that they look
more like pamphlets than books.
- Books from POD services are unlikely to be reviewed in
professional venues. Good reviews in
major newspapers and magazines, as well as trade journals like Publishers
Weekly and Library Journal, can
be a boost to sales. But trade journals will only review in advance of
publication, and POD services
rarely produce galleys or advance reading copies--or, if they do,
charge extra for it. Also, as noted
above, reviewers are wary of books from POD services.
- Your book will not be marketed or publicized. As
has already
been mentioned, POD services aren't publishers, but purveyors
of publishing services to writers. Their primary interest is in selling
their
service to you. Selling your book to readers
is of secondary importance. A listing on the company's website and with
various online booksellers, as well as
inclusion in a wholesaler's catalogue, is all the marketing many POD
services provide. If you want more, you must arrange it yourself.
Many POD services offer marketing packages or media kits for an extra
fee. But prices can top $1,000, and packages tend to be
based on minimally effective methods such as press releases, postcard
mailers, and mass solicitation of
media contacts (for a more detailed discussion of the inadequacies of
these marketing techniques, see the Writers'
Services page). They're usually a waste of money.
- There may be extra expenses. The basic cost of a
POD
service can be increased by additional costs not included
in
the initial package: renewal fees, distribution fees, extra charges for
non-template cover designs, charges for corrections in proof, etc. Be
sure,
when you're assessing a service, to check for these kinds of costs.
- Your contract may be nonstandard. In commercial
publishing, contracts vary in their particulars, but
tend to share a basic boilerplate. With POD services, there's no
standardization. Many of the services offer decent contracts, but
others are not so author-unfriendly. Look for a contract that's
nonexclusive, time-limited, terminable at will, and pertains only
to digital and electronic rights.
- Royalty income may be less than you think. POD
services typically base royalties not on a book's retail
price,
but on its net price--the retail price less discounts and/or the
publisher's
overhead (sometimes not specified, so you're not sure exactly how much
will
be deducted). What looks like a high royalty percentage may not
actually work out to a lot of money.
- Problems and delays are possible. Some POD services
have
trouble with timeliness in book production and order fulfillment. One
of the biggest, AuthorHouse, is the subject of frequent complaints
about customer
service.
Before choosing a service, it's a good idea to scout for complaints,
and to contact writers
who've used the service.
- A trend toward consolidation? Consolidation, which
changed the face of the commercial publishing industry in the 1980's
and 1990's, appears to have come to POD services. In 2007,
Author Solutions, the parent of AuthorHouse, acquired
rival POD service iUniverse. In early 2009, it purchased
another rival, Xlibris, and shortly after that, it acquired
the assets of Trafford, yet another rival. Is this a trend, or just
one company
expanding? It's too soon to tell, but still something to be aware of.
As choices shrink, so does the pressure to compete, and decreased
competition does not benefit consumers.
- Ignore the hype. POD services often portray
themselves as a
revolutionary new publishing model that's opening up a world of
opportunity for writers
locked out of the market by the narrow standards of the monopolistic
commercial publishing industry. Heady terms
like "paradigm" and "democratization" are tossed around. POD juggernaut
Author Solutions has even recently begun attempting to rebrand itself
as an
"indie
publisher" (see Writer
Beware's debunking of that particular weasel wording).
But there's nothing new about paying to get published--or about the
opportunity it offers, which is mainly
for the publishing service to make a profit. Most
of the traditional difficulties faced by authors who vanity publish are
duplicated in the POD self-publication model.
If
You Decide to Use a Service
Go into it
with
your eyes open. Consider all the issues and challenges
identified above, and factor them into your plans.
Take stock of
your goals. Be sure that a POD service is a good match for them.
Have a plan. Know what
you want to accomplish
by self-publishing. Draw up a list of what you'd like to receive from a
POD self-publishing service. Decide what you're able to spend--and
don't fail to include self-promotion in your budget. Decide how much
time you can devote to your project, both before and after publication.
Being clear on
these things ahead of time will make it easier for you to evaluate POD
services and decide which one to use.
Do your research. Make
sure you carefully read POD services'
websites--including contracts, which are usually available online--so
that you know exactly what's being offered. Many authors miss extra
fees, for instance, because they don't take enough time to peruse the
fine print. Research the companies' reputations--not all are reliable
(there are resources below to help with this). If possible, contact
other authors who've used the services you're considering to find out
about their experiences. And don't forget to order a couple of the
service's books, so you
can assess physical quality and ordering efficiency.
Keep your expectations realistic.
Know the possible
limitations--and, depending on your situation, the possible
strengths--of POD self-publishing, and understand what it is and is not
likely
to accomplish for you. Writer Beware gets many complaints from authors
who
believe they've been scammed by self-publishing companies, when in
reality it's their expectations that were faulty--whether because they
didn't read their contracts carefully enough, or erroneously assumed
that self-publishing was a ticket to commercial-style success.
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