Why aren't e-books much cheaper than printed books?

[Pod's mum]

Why are downloaded books (pdf) almost the same price as 'real' books.

The publisher does not have to print, store and be left with it if it doesn't sell.

Surely the cost to them for printing etc would be more than the $2 discount they give on sending a download.

Postage from the US to Australia is often ridiculous, so it is an option I like to use.

Sites like currclick price appropriately for downloads but (when available) down-loadable curriculum from many publishers is about the same price as the nice book I am NOT getting. I'll get a daggy black and white copy I've printed myself. This should be much cheaper. (Nice printing is 86c/page. Not happening.)

I won't name publishers, that's not fair to single out one of many.

Rant over.

Any self-publishers who want to give their view please do.

Anyone else feel this way please speak up.

Ta

[LucyStoner]

A small % of most books price is the printing and the shipping to the store. Most of it is the writing, the marketing, the editing. Per book, large runs of bestsellers and sought after books have low production cost. Lower now that most books are not printed in first world countries anymore to boot.

[Pod's mum]

I don't buy bestsellers, I'm talking about small run homeschool publishers.

Surely it costs them more than $1.50 to $2 to print and stock a glossy, colour, bound book of around 80 to 200 pages?

Maybe they really can do it that cheaply???

[LucyStoner]

I don't buy bestsellers' date=' I'm talking about small run homeschool publishers.

Surely it costs them more than $1.50 to $2 to print and stock a glossy, colour, bound book of around 80 to 200 pages?

Maybe they really can do it that cheaply???[/quote']

 

I worked for a small publisher in college. They were not printing huge runs but the per book cost was still low- less than $2 depending on size. Never underestimate the low marginal cost of additional copies once something is on the press. I worked for a small community newspaper and a run of 1000 would cost $700. A run of 25,000 was less then $1800 total. The second 1000 issues was less than $50. Back to books, even self publishing is only a few bucks a book ($3-6 for paperbacks), if it is a popular curriculum material it is printed on a larger scale that that and costs go down. Most of the cost is company and intellectual driven, not printing related. Also there are page setting and layout issues with eBooks. Online delivered content seems as though it should be cheap but in reality, it is not all that much cheaper to produce.

[Candid]

I don't buy bestsellers' date=' I'm talking about small run homeschool publishers.

Surely it costs them more than $1.50 to $2 to print and stock a glossy, colour, bound book of around 80 to 200 pages?

Maybe they really can do it that cheaply???[/quote']

 

For the regular publishing industry, I suspect they are correct printing costs are pretty small compared to overhead. They have to pay for editors for every book and some lose money so successful books carry that cost.

 

However, I have always felt that some straight to PDF things offered to the home school market are over priced. I wonder if they include an ability to get your money back if it turns out what you might is mostly fluff and you know, pretty soon after getting it that is worthless? And while it is all well and good to provide samples, the lack of ability to look over the complete work is not a good situation. Then we come to resale, with a real book, you can recoup some of the cost, but with most ebooks you are stuck with no resale.

[JFSinIL]

And maybe many e-books are for a limited readership, so not all that many sold...yet the author/editors etc. still hope to make some money off their work! You are paying, still, for content, not just physical bound wads of paper like with a "real" book.

[Lady Florida.]

You can thank Steve Jobs (posthumously, of course). If you google 'agency model' you'll find plenty more about it.

[Paisley Hedgehog]

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[TheHomeScientist]

A small % of most books price is the printing and the shipping to the store. Most of it is the writing, the marketing, the editing. Per book, large runs of bestsellers and sought after books have low production cost. Lower now that most books are not printed in first world countries anymore to boot.

 

Speaking as someone who's made a living as a full-time author since the mid-90's, not really, although that's what publishers would like everyone to believe.

 

As to the writing cost, it's pretty trivial. Excepting the really huge names, fiction authors typically get a $2,000 to $20,000 advance against royalties for a book. (And the names of those getting $20,000 advances are quite familiar to many readers and library patrons; $2,000 to $5,000 is more the norm nowadays.) In fiction, authors typically earn a royalty of 6% to 10% of the cover price (rarely more). In non-fiction, it's half that.

 

As to marketing cost, for the vast majority of titles it's zero. Literally. As an author, you're responsible for marketing the book yourself. The publisher will send out a press release. If you're lucky, it may be about your book alone, but often your book will be buried in a large list of upcoming titles. Book tours, signings, co-op and so on are only for the top 0.1% of authors (in terms of sales volume). If you see a mid-list author doing a bookstore signing, it's almost certain he or she paid all of the costs personally.

 

As to editing costs, most books get absolutely minimal editing. I'm talking a copy-edit pass by a recent college English major graduate who earns peanuts, usually not much more than minimum wage. These kids (mostly girls) often live four to an apartment because they can't afford New York City rents otherwise. The days when publishers had real editors doing substantive edits, making real suggestions to improve a book, and so on, are long gone.

 

There are differences between fiction and non-fiction, but the real issue is always publisher overheads. Which is why so many authors are fleeing traditional publishing and going to self-publishing. If an author publishes an ebook with a traditional publisher, it'll be grossly overpriced--$10 or more. After agent's commission of 15%, the author ends up earning a net royalty of 14.9%, or a $1.49 on that $10 e-book. If the author self-publishes that same book at, say, $2.99, he or she will earn a $2.04 royalty from Amazon.com, not to mention selling at least 10 times as many copies and often 100 times as many.

[Pod's mum]

Thank you for your responses.

 

"Back to books, even self publishing is only a few bucks a book ($3-6 for paperbacks),"

(And I presume a deal more for large, colour books?)

"if it is a popular curriculum material it is printed on a larger scale that that and costs go down. Most of the cost is company and intellectual driven, not printing related. Also there are page setting and layout issues with eBooks."

(Not when is is a straight PDF of an existing book)

"Online delivered content seems as though it should be cheap but in reality, it is not all that much cheaper to produce." kijipt

 

 

TheHomeScientist, I'll bear your observations in mind if I ever write/publish anything.

 

"Then we come to resale, with a real book, you can recoup some of the cost, but with most ebooks you are stuck with no resale. " Candid

This I find an issue too, not that I'm happy to hand on many books, but with curriculum that does not fit, then this is relevant.

 

So maybe I need to stick to purely made for download and priced accordingly, or suck-it-up and pay postage.

I have more than once paid around $30 before for individual 2nd hand books to be mailed from the US and other's I've been quoted MUCH more and declined. Normally I go through bookdepository, but they only 'have what they have'.

 

So this is an issue, not just complaining about a couple of $'s.

 

(Sorry haven't learned to do quote boxes yet and could not see a prompt.)

 

Edited for typos and not realising I used a cuss word! I thought people were just being coy, I didn't realise this forum edited questionable word-parts.

Edited January 22, 2012 by Pod's mum