Choosing The Right Book Printers For You
Traditionally, getting your book printed would have entailed engaging with an established publishing house willing to take your work and print, publish and distribute on your behalf. As, perhaps, an unknown or unestablished writer, finding a publisher would be, in itself, a difficult task – then, if you were to be ‘taken on’ by a publishing house, the charges and financial overheads for their services would eat very heavily into any monies generated from your book. Nowadays, with the development of online software and advances in the print industry services, it is possible – and may well be preferable – to self-publish your book. Here are some important aspects of choosing your book printers for you to consider:
Book Printing Services
Book printing services are not publishers as such – having printed your book, the distribution and marketing aspects are your responsibility to get your book into the marketplace. What an online book printing company will do is to take your finished digital manuscript and produce the requisite number of printed copies of your work. They will offer the two options of ‘print on demand’ or ‘offset printing’ to produce your book in either paperback or hardback formats.
Print On Demand
Print on demand book printing is self-explanatory – once a book has been ordered then it will be printed. The developments in digital book printing enables printers to produce an exact number of copies at any given time at a rapid turnaround time of days – this is a great advantage as it removes the need for inventory storage and avoids possible ‘overprinting’ with copies of the book left unused or unwanted. Established online print companies usually offer some links from their printed works to sales and distribution channels enabling your book to be accessed by potential customers just a few ‘clicks’ away online! This on demand print service is a great option because there are few upfront costs involved – once the files are loaded onto the printer’s system the individual cost of each book is absorbed upon the arrival of each order – that is the cost of each book production is deducted from the individual sale price at source.
Offset Book Printing
Traditional publishers generally use offset book printing to produce copies – a set quantity of books is ordered ranging from hundreds to perhaps thousands, and these are all produced in one print run, with the more copies you order, the cheaper each individual book unit becomes. Whilst this can greatly reduce the cost of your printing overall, you can run the risk of producing too many copies that may not sell, along with the issues of, with a substantial print order, storage, and distribution of your books. If you are an established author with something of a guarantee of high sales for your books then this may be the preferable option – however, if you are not guaranteed sales of your work, then you should approach this option with some caution!
Questions To Ask
There are many considerations when you come to choose your book printers – firstly, obviously the cost of the book printing service per unit, but also research and confirm print service aspects such as turnaround time for printing, what kind of ‘finish’ can your printer provide (book binding, hardback, paperback and such), the type and quality of paper stock available for your book, and will the images be reproduced in high resolution. Environmentally friendly printing may be a concern to you, so check where the print materials are sourced and confirm the printers’ environmental impact of the services they provide.
Evaluate The Service
It is worthwhile seeking out books previously printed by your chosen print company – perhaps speak with other authors who have used their services and compare their rates for the different services offered against other print companies. Whilst it is not a straightforward nor easy process to get your book into print, with the right book printers you can have the great pleasure of seeing and holding the end result of all your hard work in writing and publishing your book.
Choose Print2Demand
We are an all round UK book manufacturing and printing service. We work closely with publishers, self publishers and authors. We have a state of the art factory, complemented by our sales and marketing office in Westoning, Bedfordshire. We have invested in the very latest digital and litho printing technology, to integrate with a fully equipped craftsman bindery. The conclusion of which means we are offering both softback and hardback books, to a very high standard of quality.
Order your book printing online or contact our team for more information.