The Ins And Outs of Print On Demand Publishing

Posted by John Harricharan · 2 Comments 

Publishers and authors today have at their disposal a revolutionary way to get their books published. No longer do they have to print 3,000 copies of their books and wait for months to get them.

From the moment they have their finished, edited and formatted copy of the book to the time they receive their hard copies, their wait would have been reduced to somewhere between 4 to 6 weeks. That’s the power of today’s printing technology.

And it’s getting better each day. I predict that within a decade, an author would be able to go from completed, formatted manuscript to printed book in a few days. In some cases such as the Espresso Machine being promoted by Lightning Source, that is already happening.

Print on Demand Publishing – Formatting

To use this method, you have to have your book formatted in a particular way. There are many services that can do this at a relatively small cost. Or you can do it yourself if you have the right software and know-how.

You can format your work in Microsoft Word and go from there into a PDF file using Adobe Acrobat software. Actually, new versions of Microsoft Word make it possible for you to go directly to PDF format without having to purchase additional software.

I do not suggest becoming a technophile unless you already are one and you enjoy that. It would be simpler, by far, to use an outside service, which can easily be found online.

Now, just to repeat what I’ve said, you convert (or let someone else convert) your word processing document of your manuscript into a PDF file. After you have your PDF file, you need to get a cover for your book. Many services are available to make a cover.

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What To Expect With Print On Demand

POD (Print on Demand) can be used to produce as little as one book at a time, as needed. This method is so fast and so efficient that you could have as many copies as you need in a very short period.

You may have already guessed that the price per copy depends on how many books you print. If you choose to print only 50 copies, your price per copy would be much more than if you were printing 1,000 copies.

Let’s just run through a quick comparison of prices for POD printing of 50 books versus regular, offset printing of 3,000 books. Since prices are changing all the time, this comparison uses relative costs and may or may not be the prices that are available at the time you read this article.

If you were to go for the regular, offset (paper and ink method) of printing 3,000 books, your cost per book would be approximately $1.75 (a rough estimate – it changes all the time) and your total expenditure, just for printing, would be approximately $5,250.

If you were to choose POD, you could start with as small a quantity as 50 and go up to as many copies as you’d like. Let’s assume your book is 160 pages with 60# paper and a 10-point, laminated, 4-color cover (soft-cover). Here are some estimates of quantity and price:

Quantity 50 200
Unit Cost $4.50 $4.50
Total $225 $900

I obtained the above estimates from various sources. Those figures are only an educated guess based on my many decades of being in the publishing business. They change constantly and so you should obtain your own estimates when you’re ready to publish.

There are many companies who would be willing to give you an estimate based on the characteristics of the book you intend to publish (size, number of pages, type of paper, etc.)

One of the best reasons for using POD is that you do not have to be burdened with an inventory of thousands of books. You can order as few copies or as many as you want.

Also, some print on demand publishers such as Lightning Source will allow you to list your book through online bookstores like Amazon.com and BarnesAndNoble.com and will print your book as orders come in. This frees you from the tedious and frustrating process of having to handle your book inventory.

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  1. on demand content says:
    March 18, 2010 at 1:14 pm

    [...] model. Unfortunately for those who publish with a POD their books will not be accepted in thePrint On Demand Publishing | Authors UniversityPrint on demand publishing can be a terrific way to produce small quantities of books as you need [...]

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  2. Print Your Own Book? A Look at Print on Demand | Developers and Publishers says:
    February 11, 2010 at 5:59 pm

    [...] marketing their books to best-seller status. If you’re looking for more information on how to print your own book, download his free “Get Published Blueprint” at [...]

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