Self-Publishing Art Books (and print management in general)
Last year I designed and self-published my wife’s art book: ECHO NOUVEAU http://www.echo-nouveau.com.
After careful research, negotiating and comparison shopping I chose to work with Arte Prensa based in Miami and was generally pleased with the results. Arte Prensa is actually a book printer, not a publisher. Printers will print the books and may even help out on design and layout if you need it – but they won’t market it for you. Publishers handle the whole marketing thing and put your book into stores. I don’t have any of those contacts. We self-published and handle the marketing and distribution ourselves. We got her book into Diamond’s Previews to sell it to comic stores and did… okay. If you’re looking for a publisher, I don’t have any personal experience with that yet.
This printer was pretty good considering the price. I live in Florida, so the fact that they printed in Colombia worked out great for us. Some other printers use China. That takes weeks longer to produce, and there are so many copyright thieves in China that we didn’t want to risk it.
We got 1,000 100-page 9×12 hardcover with a spot varnish (cover only) for about $9,000. That’s a good price. We could sell it wholesale for about $16, retail for $40 but give the stores enough room to mark down on sale to $30 and still be happy.
There is one printer who uses China uses numbers are suspect. His pitch was great but he danced around the numbers. This pitch was for us to print 2,500 books plus 250 “special hardcover editions” that we could sell for $250 each and “that alone would cover the printing costs!” So 250x$175 is $44,000… which he would need to be paid up front. I know printing extremely well, and these 250 “special hardcover editions” would alone cost $20,000, so 2,500 for $24,000 is just under $10 each. I paid $9k for 1,000 which is less per book. That threw me for a loop because since MORE books usually means a lower price, 1,000 books from this joker would be more like $16,000, which I couldn’t afford. But he wasn’t happy to lose a $16,000 sale – so he had this great speech to sell me $44,000 up front because he’s such a nice guy. Always use your calculator.
Print Management
Every printer has a person who will work with you to make sure your job gets done correctly. They are your advocate to the pressmen. Their general title is “Account Services” or “Account Managers” and their job is to manage you – not your job. It is YOU who manages your printing job.
Here is a list of standard items you should get when working with a reputable printer. These are NOT exceptional. These are standards. If a printer balks at giving you any one of them don’t give them your business.
- Paper Mock-Up
This is a simple book put together with blank paper of the EXACT stock you’ve chosen to use. This is something you should get before final decision on papers – not after. IF anyone gives you bulshit about “having to buy the paper just for this book” then ditch them. Reputable printers use the same paper selections over and over again, so they should only be making one out of their stock. This of course, doesn’t apply if you want some really rare custom paper – but if you know that much, you don’t need to read any more of this little blog post. - Blue Lines or color comp
If the job will be printed offset (books usually are), then this is a Cyan-only print of the entire book. This is the final chance you have to proof how the book is printed. Warning: This book was produced from plates, which means any correction you find will often incur a plate correction charge. Makes sense though. You should have proofed better before going to plate. - Digital Color proof IN PRINT of all pages with art
Don’t let a printer deny this to you. Many who complain will do so because they lo-balled you on the price and didn’t include the cost of this little number. But really – how else are you going to proof the color calibration of your art? Seriously! Changes here should not incur a plate charge unless you signed something approving them to go to plate first. DON’T DO THAT! Only allow them to go to plate after the blue-line and this Digital Color Proof are approved. If they whine, then it’s their dime. They should know better. - 5%-10% overrun
I ran into this problem with Arte Prensa. I purchase 1,000 books and when they arrived I only got 1,000 books. WTF! Why am I pissed? Well, because the printing process is difficult to maintain perfect quality control. While paper in the main cost in printing, 5%-10% of wholesale is piddly. Also, since the book is already on press, it cost nothing to keep the machines running for an extra 5 minutes (they run REALLY FAST) to produce enough extra books to make the client happy. I bought 1,000 books for me to sell. I didn’t buy 950 book to sell and 50 to throw in the trash. Reputable printers will always overprint to make sure you are happy and have the correct number of quality product because the next time you go to press, you’ll shop around to find someone who won’t dick you around. Now, in this case, I brought it to the attention of the owner and after a few days of discussion he finally decided to give me a price break on shipping and ensure I would get my overrun on the next job. That was a nice gesture and I believe he will, but it was ridiculous that I had to argue for it and what I really want is my 50 books that got screwed up reprinted. Shipping was $200. 50 books at $9 each is $450 spent. 50 books at $31 profit is over $1,500 in profit lost. He cost me $2,000 but gave me $200 – not exactly the kind of relationship one wants to have in business.
