Print on demand is a new printing technology which
delivers, literally, print on demand. It has the power to change the way
books are published radically, although many publishers are not yet using
it on any scale and many writers are not yet familiar with its
possibilities.What is Print on Demand?
It’s worth therefore starting with a definition. The traditional
‘batch printing’ approach has been
used by publishers to print a few thousand books at a time. Print on
demand enables the books to be printed one at a time, literally ‘on
demand’. The book, including the cover, is set up as a digital file.
When an order comes through, the right file is selected by the computer,
which then gives the instruction to the print on demand machine to produce
it. There is therefore a set-up cost, which covers setting up the file in
the system, and a small annual charge for keeping it there. The actual
cost of producing each individual book is rather more than the batch
printing cost per unit, but huge economies are made elsewhere. It has
also enabled the overall cost of producing a book to be substantially
reduced. (See Advantages of
Print on Demand)
Permanently in print
Print on demand has the potential to revolutionise the way publishing
works, although it has not yet been adopted on the kind of scale that
would enable publishers to realise its potential. Many of the publishers
who are using it at this stage see it as a cost-effective way of
keeping the backlist going. The book need never go out of print.
Instead of lost sales because the book is o/p (out of print), sales which
have in the past been gone for good unless the book is reprinted, it
can continue in print indefinitely. It is particularly cost-effective
for publishers to use POD for their backlist because the setting and cover
already exist, and therefore the set-up cost involved is only the
comparatively minor one of digitising the book.
Reducing other costs
Print on demand also offers publishers two other extremely valuable
advantages. Books are printed to order, so there are no storage or
warehousing costs, and no money tied up in stock. The system also
reduces returns, since books are only printed to order. Stock write-offs
and remaindering, which are the bane of a publisher’s life, can be avoided
entirely. A slightly higher cost of goods can be factored into the
equation and still leave a more profitable outcome when all these other
possibilities have been factored out.
What about the quality?
The actual technology of POD has improved immensely over the last few
years. There is still a feeling in some circles that the resulting books
are inferior in quality, but this is no longer the case. The big IBM and
Xerox POD machines are an amazing sight. Controlled completely by
computer, the latest presses at one of the biggest POD printers, Lightning
Source, can produce up to four books a minute. To date the POD
printers have concentrated on ‘trade’ paperbacks, i.e. larger than A or B
format, or what is known as ‘rack-sized’ in the States. Soon they will be
able to tackle the smaller paperback formats effectively. They are already
able to produce hardbacks, although the binding is mostly currently done
elsewhere. POD technology is most widely adopted in the USA, where
Lightning Source, one of the biggest players, is now operating 24
hours, seven days a week, and producing more than 500,000 books a month.
Transforming the economics of publishing
What is perhaps less immediately apparent are the other opportunities
that Print on Demand offers. For publishers it is a cost-effective way of
keeping the slower-moving backlist in print. But it also potentially
transforms the economics of publishing, allowing books to be published
with very much less initial investment and ongoing cost. This
represents a real opportunity for small start-ups in the publishing world.
The advantages for authors
For authors the benefits are two-fold. Firstly, published authors
are far more likely to have their books kept in print. The
disadvantage of this, which is already causing some anxiety amongst
agents, is the difficulty of defining whether a book is actually in print
as defined in the contract, especially if you might actually prefer to
have the rights back.
Self-publishing
The second benefit is that because the upfront costs of POD are so much
lower, it brings publishing within the range of a great many more
people, including writers. So, if you are thinking about
self-publishing, POD makes this possible at a far more realistic cost.
This is the technology we are using to print the books in our
WritersPrintShop self-publishing service
and it is remarkable how it has transformed the possibilities, giving
the opportunity for writers to consider self-publishing as a realistic
alternative to finding a publisher.
What next?
The death of batch printing has been widely foretold. Perhaps we can
look forward to a time when each book can be produced to order for the
customer in the bookshop. At the moment the economics of batch printing
and the high cost of the POD machines makes this seem a distant
possibility. But technology can bring rapid change and it is already
possible to get a book printed on demand in some Canadian bookshops.
Chris Holifield
