My first essay was uploaded to Createspace. It had been rejected by penguin, New York on the basis it would not make them enough money so I thought it had some chance of success.
The Createspace system was very easy to use but at the time (2010) they were really only of use to USA citizens as postage to the UK was high. I also used one of their free ISBNs.
The quality did not seem at all bad to my eye and was better than the lulu version. Lulu did not have as firm covers and once opened they bent over. I recently bought a Createspace novel and their covers have now become like lulu's were.
The Lightning Source sign up process is free but has to be done as they only deal with publishers. You are assigned a named officer who deals with your account and contacts in the accounts department and in international sales if you sign up for them.
The proof process as with all of them, allows you to send proofs to only one address.at a time but unlike Createspace you can create as many proof orders as you like and send them to different addresses. Useful if your team live indifferent places, though the cost of a proof is high. £20 for a typical 200 page colour book.
Because you are a publishers it serves you to buy your own sets of ISBNs. In the Uk this cost me £160 for ten, with a one-time-only £90 registration fee. The second lot of 100 ISBNs cost me the same, so the unit price goes down markedly.
Lightning Source - as with the others I think -generates an ISBN for the cover from the number you give them.
The problem at the moment is the lack of choice with all these companies, of paper quality. The covers seem adequate, but two paper sizes and style, white or off-white. That's it. different thickness for colour and black and white books. Really we need at least six weight choices for a fuller range of books.
Upload costs at Lightning Source are not free. Cover and interior will cost you £54 and changes to each £27 a time. So know what you are doing. If you need to make a change on a book that is selling well they will wait for a break ins ales before taking it off-line and replacing the files with the new ones. You do not want that to ever happen.
Sales are all recorded but you have no idea if they are true, there are no trail from the recorded sales to the customer that you are given.
Payments by BACS start three months after the first books are sold so you will need to plan for that three months, after that as sales continue, you will receive a prompt monthly royalty but always three months in arrears.
Orders for books I have placed to go to festivals and for launches arrive swiftly (5 days) and they have opened manufacture centres in USA/UK/Germany/Australia and now in Latin America. Distributed through Ingrams their coverage is better than anyone else in the competition.
The Createspace system was very easy to use but at the time (2010) they were really only of use to USA citizens as postage to the UK was high. I also used one of their free ISBNs.
The quality did not seem at all bad to my eye and was better than the lulu version. Lulu did not have as firm covers and once opened they bent over. I recently bought a Createspace novel and their covers have now become like lulu's were.
The Lightning Source sign up process is free but has to be done as they only deal with publishers. You are assigned a named officer who deals with your account and contacts in the accounts department and in international sales if you sign up for them.
The proof process as with all of them, allows you to send proofs to only one address.at a time but unlike Createspace you can create as many proof orders as you like and send them to different addresses. Useful if your team live indifferent places, though the cost of a proof is high. £20 for a typical 200 page colour book.
Because you are a publishers it serves you to buy your own sets of ISBNs. In the Uk this cost me £160 for ten, with a one-time-only £90 registration fee. The second lot of 100 ISBNs cost me the same, so the unit price goes down markedly.
Lightning Source - as with the others I think -generates an ISBN for the cover from the number you give them.
The problem at the moment is the lack of choice with all these companies, of paper quality. The covers seem adequate, but two paper sizes and style, white or off-white. That's it. different thickness for colour and black and white books. Really we need at least six weight choices for a fuller range of books.
Upload costs at Lightning Source are not free. Cover and interior will cost you £54 and changes to each £27 a time. So know what you are doing. If you need to make a change on a book that is selling well they will wait for a break ins ales before taking it off-line and replacing the files with the new ones. You do not want that to ever happen.
Sales are all recorded but you have no idea if they are true, there are no trail from the recorded sales to the customer that you are given.
Payments by BACS start three months after the first books are sold so you will need to plan for that three months, after that as sales continue, you will receive a prompt monthly royalty but always three months in arrears.
Orders for books I have placed to go to festivals and for launches arrive swiftly (5 days) and they have opened manufacture centres in USA/UK/Germany/Australia and now in Latin America. Distributed through Ingrams their coverage is better than anyone else in the competition.