CreateSpace

MarkP wrote:

"Why should the 'self published' author pay the markup on the printing of the book that lulu charges?"

Ah, you're bringing up the whole middleman versus go-straight-to-the-printer issue. Well, the simple answer is that not everyone has the knowledge to deal directly with a printer, and some people are willing to pay folks who do have the knowledge, to do the work on their behalf. As Christine N says, Lulu makes things very easy for authors, and it also offers a terrific support system.

Having struggled with Lightning Source's Website, I'm sympathetic with that view. But I do think that more needs to be done to educate self-publishing authors, so that they can realize that Lulu is a middleman, and that cheaper alternatives exist.

On the issue of royalties: Lulu is both a subsidy press and a self-publishing service, depending on which of their plans you go with. The issue isn't whether they take a cut of the profit. If you'll look at the first post in your thread, you'll see that Lightning Source - the main printer used by self-publishers who cut out the middleman - also takes a cut of the profit. That's what distributors do, and it's very, very difficult to sell a printed book without a distributor (though one can sell an e-book that way).

The issue is rather who owns the ISBN. As is clear from this FAQ, in cases where Lulu owns the ISBN, it's acting as a subsidy press, and so it distributes royalties. In cases where the authors owns the ISBN or there is no ISBN, Lulu is simply acting as a middleman for the printer (it doesn't do its own printing, by the way), and so it distributes author revenues. The IRS understands this distinction; I hope you do too.

I might add that, when Lulu sells e-books and other digital downloads, it is not a middleman; it's doing all the work itself. So in that case, the middleman issue doesn't arise, though its distribution is limited to its own Website.

My perception is that they're much more honest than the average business. The first thing they tell you is that you're not likely to make much money on your book. And they're quite clear on the fact that you don't need to buy the extras in order to publish through them.

"The reason I know this is because I have asked."

Or you could have seen that from my figures at the beginning of this thread.

I agree that it's unpleasant that they're not honest about the fact that they're upping the printing costs, but the formula by which they pay their own costs seems to be a very complex one. For example, an author pays $99 for a Published By You packet (currently on sale for $50, I believe), which includes an ISBN and printing by Lightning Source. Though Lulu doesn't say this, that fee must be going to Lightning Source, which charges just about that much for the set-up fee. So how is Lulu paying for the ISBN? Or the annual Lightning Source fee? Possibly it's partly by padding the printing expenses. At any rate, all of this financial decision-making goes on behind the scenes.

What it comes down to, I think, is that publishing is always a matter of Buyer Beware. If an author were using a local print shop, they'd likewise have to be wary of any claims made by the printer. Comparison shopping is best.

"Not everyone get the 'published by you' package, but they all have to go through LS to be printed."

Everyone who purchases the Global Distribution package, I think you mean. Folks who buy only the Basic Distribution package are printed by another printer, whose name isn't publicized.

"If you were go to it yourself, and purchase an ISBN and then pay LS, you'd pay alot more than Lulu charges. They may pad the fees, but I think in the end it probably works out close."

Indeed, you have to pay $270 for twenty ISBNs to work with Lightning Source, which is a hefty fee if you're only publishing one book, or if you're anticipating on selling no more than one or two hundred copies. So Lulu is a good choice for tiny press runs; I even know traditional self-publishers who use Lulu for things like review copies. It's also a good choice if you only want to sell through your own Website and through Lulu's storefront. It's an excellent choice for e-books; I don't know of any other online bookstore that takes only a twenty percent cut.

For larger sales of POD books that will be distributed through other sources: No, the padded printing costs add up. So does the fact that Lulu automatically sets the distributors' percentage at fifty percent, while at Lightning Source you can set it lower (and will want to, if you're only selling to online bookstores). Look at the figures at the beginning of this thread again; the profit from a Lightning Source book can be something like twenty times greater than the profit from a Lulu book.

But the other side of the coin is that Lightning Source usually works with publishers or experienced self-publishers, and so it doesn't make things easy for beginning self-publishers. That's what you get for the fees you pay to Lulu: ease of use. And a lot of authors consider that worth the money.

What's troubling isn't that these different alternatives exist - different approaches are good, because not every shoe is going to fit everyone - but that a lot of self-publishers don't know what the different alternatives are. So I think that laying out what you will get from different services is helpful.

"Then I discovered that I had to buy and approve my own book to launch its sale."

I'm afraid that Lulu has the same requirement for its Global Distribution books (though not for the books that are sold only at its Website, which I gather is the route you took). I'm sorry to hear that you had so many problems in uploading the book to CreateSpace.

"My paperback narrative costs only $9,60 (http://www.lulu.com/content/1357480) - I don't know the situation in other countries, but it is not a great sum in my country."

It's a good price in the U.S.; trade paperbacks are usually more expensive than that. I think your novel is shorter than the average SF/F novel, which is why the price worked out so well for you.

Congratulation on getting your book out!