Does Print On Demand Threaten
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| Many Internet booksellers have asked me how print on demand (POD) services will affect the online book market. What they don’t know is that POD is the best thing for Internet bookselling since sliced bread! What Is Print On Demand? POD is a printing methodology combined with digital technology that can economically produce as few as a single copy of a paperback book. Therefore, publishers can eliminate the burden of inventory and warehousing costs because books are not printed until orders are placed and paid for by consumers. |
Even more cost savings are obtained through the implementation of distributive printing. This is achieved when POD equipment manufacturers partner with local printing plants sprinkled around the country.
When orders arrive, the printing is done on digital equipment at the printing plant nearest to the customer. Thus, inbound freight expenses are lower because the finished product has shorter distances to travel to publishers.
Another major advantage of print on demand is that the content and artwork exist in the form of a digital file. It’s very easy to make revisions to the book and sell a new edition. Producing a new edition of a traditionally printed book is expensive and time consuming.
| POD saves publishers money by shortening set-up time, providing instant printing capability, and giving them a permanent backlist of titles. |
That’s because traditional printing processes requires a great deal of manual manipulation of book files before it’s ready for offset printing. Final adjustments to POD files occur automatically and no human intervention is necessary. An example of this technological marvel is the Espresso Book Machine. As soon as a file is uploaded to the system printing can take place almost immediately.
Finally, unlike traditional books, publishers who utilize print on demand never have to allow titles to go out-of-print. Since the books exist in a digital format there are no carrying costs to store inventory and publishers can print one copy at a time as orders come in.
| The Publishing Playing Field Is Leveled Publishers aren’t the only ones who can reap the many benefits of POD publishing. Self-published authors have discovered that they can easily bypass traditional publishing channels and take their work directly to the buying public. When an author lands a traditional publishing contract it can take as long as two years before the book is published. Even then, the author can expect to receive from 8% - 10% in royalties. For a book selling for an average of $25, that’s a $2.50 royalty per book sold at best. |
Self-publishing with print on demand technology is much more lucrative. A typical POD book can be produced for as little as $4 for a single copy. When the book is sold directly to consumers, authors pay a modest 15% commission to an online marketplace, bringing the total cost to about $7 to make the sale; leaving a whopping $13 profit to the author.
Which would you rather have, a $2.50 profit or $13 profit? Well, "It depends" would be the correct answer. If the traditional publisher can sell 100,000 copies of the book then $2.50 might be the better choice.
However, given the reality that most books sell fewer than 500 copies, authors are better off self-publishing and marketing it through an established online marketplace. If only 500 copies are sold the author stands to earn $6,500 instead of the $1,250 offered by a traditional publisher.
Why POD Matters To Internet Booksellers
Lowering the cost of publishing books has sparked a flood of new authors into the market. These small press authors are printing books at an astounding rate.
Many of those books will wind up in thrift stores, library book sales, garage sales, used book stores, and estate sales; just like books produced by conventional methods.
These self-published books will be printed in much smaller numbers and therefore hold their value much longer than books printed in the hundreds of thousands. This all but guarantees a large and profitable resale market for dealers who sell books online.
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