Michael R. Hicks

Thank you for the most intelligent review of POD options I’ve read thusfar online!

KreelanWarrior,
Great, great info you’ve provided here. Very simple and clear, which the LIGHTNING SOURCE website IS NOT. My complaint with their website is that I could not find a word about costs or book pricing guides. Nada. Why not, I do not know. Since it is their strength — low costs.

Thanks again for this.
John L.

Nice sharing about Print On Demand Options, Part 4: Lightning Source..To know more about pod visit http://www.bhavishgraphics.com/print-on-demand.html

What do you think is an optimal trade discount for my LSI book with no returns in order to optimize sales but not give away too much profit or raise the book price unnecessarily?

Thanks Michael. That’s very helpful and confirm’s what Morris Rosenthal says in his “POD Book Publishing.” LSI’s policy of setting just one discount rate for everyone seems quite limiting. How can Ingram or B&T resell the book and everyone make a profit at that rate? Or does this only work for STOP orders?

Thanks again Michael. You make perfect sense in an area that seems quite unclear and murky.

I have a book currently published with CreateSpace and listed on Amazon. If I publish the same book through LSI do you know how Amazon handles that in terms of the current listing? Am I correct that if CreateSpace is charging 40% of the sale, a 25% discount to Amazon through LSI would make more sense over time. Does Amazon take any other piece of the transaction other than the 25% discount?

Can you tell me if the prices included in the article “Print On Demand Options, Part 4: Lightning Source” are current? Do you know what they charge for printing a hardcover book?

Thanks

I’ve been using LSI for years, as a POD printer. I have yet to use their distribution services as I am mostly a publishing services provider. People hire me to format and print their books, and I let them figure out how to sell them. I am very discouraged lately, however. I uploaded a book fairly heavy with halftones and received a proof copy which, while some of the illustrations were not perfect, on the whole was acceptable. So I went ahead and ordered a large number of copies. When these arrived the illustrations looked terrible, not at all like in the proof copy. My client looked at the books and refused to pay for them (and I don’t blame him). When I brought this up to my client rep at LSI, this person told me that they could run another proof if I wanted to resubmit the file, but that I was responsible for the shipment of books I received. I’m going to speak with my attorney about my liability in this situation, but I still need to get this book printed. Should I find another POD printer? If so who (doesn’t LSI pretty much control the market)? What about the dozen or so titles in my LSI library? Should I crawl back to LSI and submit a revised file despite what they’ve done to me?

Thanks very much for your advice and encouragement. My plan is to do exactly as you suggest, although I would not bother to go back to my client rep. She made it very clear that she would not do anything for me, that this was all my fault. So I will call and ask to speak to her superior. If they will waive the charges on the 250 copies I would be happy to tear off all the covers and send them back to them. The books are going to the dump anyway. I hope that we can come to an accommodation. I have a number books in my library at LSI, and my refusal to pay or legal action would only result in their dropping my account. Which means for those clients of mine I would have to start over again with another POD printer, Createspace or Booksurge. I have prepared files for submission to CS for another client, although I never got a look at the proof from that job. Their work couldn’t be any more careless than LSI’s. I guess the moral of the story with digital book manufacturing is: never order more than a few copies at a time. If only everyone could afford offset.

To answer Steve Bohlert’s question about short discounting, it would be illegal for Lightning Source to give separate discounts to retailers in a B2B setting. Price discrimination for the exact same product is only legal in the B2C setting, at least in the United States.

Im working with LS right now and just wanted to put a word in on how to prepare your files. Since they only accept files that are to be ripped properly to their press, its all automated and uses the same basic technology as most high-end copiers in that your files, color, halftones, and even text, can fluctuate with temperature and from press to press. I suspect they are using the same printer as most shops, like Booksurge, an Indigo 5000, with an operator running the files through and not really checking proof-vs-print. The reason is volume. They make runs per order and pump those sheets through as fast as the industry demands. You get a proof and, again, its your file that is tweaked, not their end. This is not offset, although they do minimal offset runs of 1500, much cheaper if you have the upfront money, but then you have to store the books. Its their distribution and the 25% that wins them over. Also, I recieved color and black and white books from them and other shops and theirs was clearly higher quality. But I would never make a comparison to offset.
Setting up the files can be tricky if you don’t know what you are doing and if you have a color cover you want to do, as I did for my illustrated cover, a novel, then you need Photoshop, Indesign, Acrobat, and Distiller minimum. Once you understand what they want, and now that I understand why! (its all automated to rip fast with compressed files via 2001 pdf/x files, speed over quality) then it makes sense. Once I do my first tests, I will post a complete how to that is much simpler than their site- however, its all there, they actually did a nice job at explaining just what they want if you go through all the pdf pages, and thats a lot of work! But it will be worth it knowing I am bypassing these vanity pubs that basically send the files to them and then charge their authors a fee and markup, even though they claim not to. What a joke. I would guess nearly everyone of them uses LS anyway, except the Amazon ones, they have their own press, which, sample wise, was of poor quality.
By the way, a hardcover for the same book, according to the LS rep I spoke with, is approx $7-8 more than the soft cover perfect bound. Both the rep and the tech person I spoke with are extremely nice and willing to help. They want your books, because the company makes money off of any order. For my 500 page novel, a big book, at 6×9, they will make $7.40. (The same offset run might be around $1.50-$2) If I price it at $19.95, ($20) and go for 25% discount (the ‘wholesale’ price, what the distributors make, Amazon etc) that leaves $16- 7.40= $8.60 that they send to me at months end as the publisher. Anywhere else and I loose at least 15% more from the minimum 40% markup, even on Amazons 2 choices, BookSurge and Createspace. My only concern was, at 25%, will Amazon take, it, but the LS rep clearly said, they want to sell books, and she has never seen a book turned down. Their parent company is Ingram, so once its listed, they make it available worldwide, unlike Amazon’s being just in the US, I believe. So, things to consider. Just be aware, get the files set up right for their rip (printer) and I would avoid grayscale interiors and halftones, line should hold OK. I would be interested in hearing if anyone has done a color book with them yet as I had one set up for offset and then learned about LS’s service and the samples, I have to say, looked quite nice.
Michael, how are your books doing, by the way? Have you spent any money on marketing, promotion, etc. I was thinking of doing a net splash with video etc. Have you tried anything like that? Thanks!

One other question- once the book(s) go onto Amazons site ( I am only concerned with online distribution and sales as that must be over 60-70% of all sales now for books, according to several figures I have seen and the failing of the large store chains will only add to that figure)
Can you add Amazon’s features like look inside this book, and side by side sales, etc. I assume you can, they want your money, but I am not clear as to how to go from just seeing the book on Amazon’s site, and then actually adding features. Do you have to set up a webpage on their site? Just curious. The LS rep said she had heard it being done, but was not clear how to do it. Thanks again, Phil

I just wanted to say thank you again for this great information. I also wanted to let you know that I bought your book, and while I am still waiting for my own book to be finished before I sit down with it to read, my husband, who is an avid SF reader, snatched it away and read it and LOVED it I was happy to tell him (coming back to your site today) that you had more books in the series. He is really happy, he said “he’s are really good” (and he is quite picky).

I just wanted to share, because I think it’s good to pass on praise to authors!

Do you have any sense of what the difference in sales volume is between CreateSpace and LSI? That is, if I’m removing a title from CS and publishing it through LSI, all other things being equal, how much of a jump will I see in sales, due to new distribution channels (e.g., Barnes & Noble. I will be offering a short discount, so no brick and mortar.)? 10%? 50% 100%?

I am using CS to sell public domain books which might sell, say, 4 copies/month, so the setup cost is prohibitive. If the wider distribution yielded even a couple more sales/month, it would be economical in the long term, however.

Great article, thanks! We’ve used LSI (actually both LS UK and LS US) for over 2 years now with great satisfaction. But the last batch of 200 books they sent for a book launch next week is unsatisfactory: the books all have a pronounced wave and cannot be made to lie flat even after being pressed for a couple of days. Although the covers and text are perfectly legible, we don’t think we can sell them on without having return problems of our own. Is anyone else having problems with LS UK production quality? I believe they may have begun production on a new press; the printer has told us that the wave is “normal” and they won’t be able to do better with another batch. The books don’t look normal to me.

Can anyone tell me, can you send hard copies of your book to be printed to LS.

Hi, The preferred, and certainly the safest, method for LS is by sending a PDF file, one for the cover spread, one for the text (interior) They have it all laid out on their site, http://www.lightningsource.com/
go to the File Creation tab and you can see the screen shot documents that are downloadable. Adhere to those and you should be good to go, but I would like to add a few things here to help those interested, as this is a nice thread that seems to be full of shared ideas and that, in itself, is pretty cool.
1-For novels, First download their template, filling in the book pages which will give you the right size for the book’s width. This is an InDesign file, so if you aren’t using InDesign, I suppose there are other ways around it, but this is what they use. I found that if you do the base art design in Photoshop and then flatten the image but keep the text on a layer, you can save this as a PDF file, which will be big, but workable, and you can place that into the InDesign template (on a new layer) and the text is still vector and not rasterized (pixelated). Don’t try this if you have a block of small text, that is best set in InDesign, or copy and pasted from MS Word. The Photoshop PDF file only works if you have a few areas of text. (I am noting color books, not for novels. For novels, they want Word docs sent to Distiller as a final PDF file saved with the ISBN number)
For my color book, which I am still waiting to get the proof on, I did a test to see if parts of the 300 ppi photoshop text will look similar to the vector text from InDesign. If so, that means you could, if in a jam, just do all the design work, text and all, in Photoshop and flatten the image to place it in InDesign. (Vector text, typed in a layout program like InDesign, rips at 1200 ppi, not 300, so it is considerably sharper- however, the eye can only see so much detail and at 300, unless I put a loop on it, it should visually look the same to most readers. We’ll see. It could save a lot of time for non- InDesign users).
The other reason to download the cover template is to get the file name with ISBN number in process so that it can tie in to their system files. I made the mistake of sending my entire book and cover (2 big files) on DVD without uploading the cover separately and they confused the book with the novel so that screwed everything up. I lost 2 weeks because of that. Next book, I will definitely upload the cover and send interior files (for color books, which can be several hundred megabytes, on dvd/cd. Again, just for color books.
For color books, after you ‘print’ the InDesign files, creating very large files as postscript, you need to drop them into Adobe’s Distiller program, which condenses the file down to a fraction of the original size and maintains all the info, images, etc. You take that distilled file, which is your PDF, and open it in Acrobat and make sure the fonts are embedded.
So- it is a lengthy process and can be a bit daunting if you don’t know the programs but, through Ingram, my books are already selling on several sites and now its a matter of marketing. The color, by the way, was good and I don’t doubt it is better than what I have been hearing are complaints about CreateSpace, which is an Amazon company and very easy to upload but no real control over quality. With LS, as a publisher, you can, if you know what you are doing, control the color by simply asking for another proof and tweaking it until ready. (Around $40 each time) With the vanity presses, most of which use LS anyway, they will charge for that and you may never get what you want or you end up keeping your work so simple- basic text on a simple color background or photo, that it looks like a POD setup. All the vanity shops take a cut as well, even though some use other terms, it still comes out of what you would otherwise make, and over time, that can be a lot.
I think my books are selling a bit because I did the cover art and used LS, with gave me more control. I wouldn’t have had that flexibility with another outfit, certainly not the distribution. I believe CSpace is just US and Canada, not sure on that and they use Baker and Taylor and the percentage is 35-40% whereas with LS I have it at 25% but if they take off, as everyone hopes for their books, then I can up the percentage that the distributors will take (called the discount or margin) and around 50%, they could go into bookstores. From everything I have been following, however, the stores can’t compete with the online sales so concentrating on Amazon and B&N sites, etc, is the way to go…. I think! It would be nice to see the books in the stores and I have been told more that once that if you have a hot seller, they will take the books even with a small discount- wanting a piece of a sale rather than nothing. It would be interesting to hear other perspectives on this.

Sorry for the long explanation- it might be simpler to help people by just having them contact me and I can answer questions with what I learned through the entire LS process.
I did have one question that concerned me about Amazon’s look inside the book feature- a free but contracted service where you can see sample pages inside the book.
After looking over their lengthy contract, article 4 clearly states that they have the right to do with the work what they want and redistribute and apply it how they see fit, basically asking the author/publisher to hand them the rights. Also, they want the full book uploaded, not a problem with novels, but a big one for color books. So I was really disappointed with that and said forget it. I asked them to clarify this, to find out if they really meant that they simply were using it for distribution purposes and had no real rights to the work, but, like other issues with Amazon, they did not respond. After a week or so, I gave up, checked out Barnes and Nobel, which has a great site now, by the way, and had the book up within 5 days with the look inside feature and no contract hassles. Dealing with Amazon can be a real lesson in patience and if you have ever tried calling them, that’s nearly impossible to get a hold of anyone who actually knows any answers. I tried one day to ask a simple question, trying to get a local Amazon live person to speak with and literally, and I am not kidding, I spent 3 hours on the phone being passed various numbers and spoke with 8 people in Taiwan, Indonesia, 2 in England, one in South Africa, a couple of receptionists on the east coast, and finally landed some young kid in Costa Rica, of all places, who said he was freelancing for them and maybe I should try yet another number. Finally, I got a local guy, in Seattle, who said, oh, beats me, why not try- and I was back to the same number I started with! I have nothing against Amazon, they certainly hold their share of the market, but compared to Barnes and Noble for answering simple questions and getting things done, and they even list their numbers to reach people! they are now my first choice for marketing my books. Just info in case anyone wants to try that inside the book feature.

+1 on the thanks, Michael. Even with Create Space’s recently announced Extended Distribution Channel (EDC), it seems there are still advantages to going with LSI. With EDC the discount is automatically 60%–no options. Returnability is not an option either, which might become necessary should you want to have your book stocked at the brick & mortars. And so far it is unclear whether the distribution will extend as far around the world as LSI’s even though EDC is a partnership between Create Space and LSI. I’ve just set up my new account with LSI, so all this is helpful.

Thank you so much for all this info! Am just getting started in the process of self-publishing with my first book. Does “color book” mean a book with many color photographs, such as an interior design book might have, for example? A friend is going to try to draw a cover for me (I’m praying about this a lot!) according to my design. After she has it drawn and colored on a piece of paper, what’s the next step? Michael, you have really beautiful covers for your books. Did you both design and draw them yourself? Thanks! Donna Hamilton P.S. What is HTML?

Hi,

wow, this is a fantastic post!!! Thanks for all of that.

So to sum it up, if I go with LS, they take 25%, then amazon takes 25%, and then the rest is basically production of the book, and what is left over goes to me, correct?

I am doing a book, but also just did a film I want to distribute on amazon. there seems to be a similar concept, where you can have your DVD’s made outside of amazon (not using create space), and then either use the advantage or the fulfilment program. does anybody know how that works?

My best
Elke

Actually, the lowest percentage is 20% that Amazon will consider, but the lower you go, the less likely you are to get into the other online distributors. Remember, what percentage YOU set is what they call the ‘discount’ which means the wholesale price. So to get into bookstores, they want 50% (some55%!) and a return policy of buying back the books that don’t sell. At 25% you can forget about the bookstores, concentrate on the online, which is around 60-70% of the market anyway and growing, Amazon holding around 40% of that. Just call LS and ask them what your novel would cost to print it. At 500 pages, for example, mine is a high $8.40 for me to order, or $7.40 for an online distributor like B and Noble. I discount 25%, and the book is priced reasonably (very reasonably since its 500 pages, 6×9) at $17. Doing the math- $17-7.40=9.60 less 25% that Amazon or other makes$4.25) 9.60-4.25= net $5.35
Other important factors with LS- $75 set up fee per title, you must provide the ISBN (go to the Bowker site to get it, buy in blocks, much cheaper) and its around $30 a proof, they cover shipping. Color books are the same, my 136 8.5×11 is $15 to print, 25%, $32 to sell, I make 8 or 9 per book. Costs me nothing but the time I spent writing, editing, editing, editing…. editing…
rewriting and editing… and doing the art for the cover, which is of paramount importance, in my humble opinion. Once you approve the proof, its $12 to hook up with Ingram, the biggest wholesaler of books in the world, and guess what, they own Lightning Source, so its a no brainer. Thats exactly why most vanity presses don’t want you to know, when they order books, they just call or email LS and take their cut, something you can easily do on your own.
Downside- you must know the programs to get the PROPER files sent as final pdfs. I use 5 programs to do it, have had no problems. The people at LS are nice, and thats an understatement!
Michael, I like the idea here of the paper edges, but its really hard to see on my calibrated screens. You might want to darken that just a bit.
Phil

Oh, thought it was 20% for Amazon. I thought that was what the sales rep said. Must have changed.
Yes, $12 for the renewal, each title. And so far, being with Ingram is a real plus.
The reason I mentioned the screen is that when I look for where to type in a comment, there is no box, so others may overlook it. Maybe you can put a box or square or make the background a very light gray or tan so the box shows up…?

I found this article so useful – and the informed comments just added to it’s value. I’m just starting out with LS – and having researched many other POD “services” over the last 6 months I actually feel that I’ve chosen an organisation that is treating my activities as a serious business.

Somebody n a comment advised to buy ISBN’s in blocks – this is what I shall do – one ISBN will cost me €120 (I’m French) but a block of will cost €230. So the initial outlay is not much more for the extra 99 ISBNs and as hardback, paperback and digital versions of the same book require 3 separate ISBN’s it is a good investment.

Thanks guys, chapeau !