CHARLESTON, S.C. – Dec. 03, 2009 – CreateSpace, part of the Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) group of companies, today announced a new agreement with Lightning Source Inc., the print on-demand unit of Ingram Content Group Inc. The collaboration between the two companies will expand CreateSpace's distribution options for its members beyond Amazon.com and CreateSpace eStores.Under the new agreement, CreateSpace's Books on-Demand platform will allow members to print and then distribute their titles to thousands of bookstores, libraries and online retailers. CreateSpace members will have access to this enhanced print and distribution option as part of the CreateSpace Pro Plan, a program which gives members access to lower print pricing for their own book orders and better royalties for sales on Amazon.com.
"With this expansion, CreateSpace members will not only be able to reach Amazon.com customers, but they can also reach the thousands of bookstores, libraries and online retailers that work with the Ingram Content Group, " said Dana LoPiccolo-Giles, managing director, CreateSpace. "With Lightning Source and Ingram, our members can make their titles available to the larger book marketplace while remaining inventory-free with print on-demand."
"At Ingram, we are passionate about books and the book industry," said Philip Ollila, chief content officer, Ingram Content Group. "Our new relationship with CreateSpace is a continuation of Ingram's long-term strategy to offer the broadest selection of books to our customers worldwide."
For more information about CreateSpace, please visit http://www.createspace.com/
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Now this puts Amazon way ahead of the game when it comes to DIY publishing with expanded distribution. I was hoping for something like this to come out of the Booksurge/Createspace merger, and again, Amazon didn't disappoint. However, the pro-plan is a yearly fee, so if you sell more ebooks than print editions, it might not be the best option, but for print books it is a comparable option to going direct with Lightening Source, who charges roughly $80.00 for set-up, $30.00 for the proof, and $12.00 per year per book cataloging fee after the intial set-up fees. So, the Amazon pro-plan at $39.00 initially per book then $5.00 per year per book after that may be cost effective for some self-publishers. Again, my experience with Createspace has been stellar thus far, and this only shows that they are committed to the self-publishing experience. Not to mention they offer all the standard trade paperback sizes in their expanded distro model. That was my biggest beef with Lulu and many other DIY sites. Novellas and shorter fiction works just look like crap in the 6x9 size. Hardback books are 6x9 not paperbacks. Amazon offers the 5x8, the 5.25x8, and the 5.5x8.5 in their expanded distribution plan.
Yes, Cheryl Anne Gardner is pleased, very pleased.
4 comments:
I love CreateSpace, too. The only thing they really need to improve is customer service.
I've had dealings with their customer service twice now and had no problems at all or delay in receiving a response and resolution to my question. I guess it depends on the day and who you get. I've been lucky.
Color me sold on this. I would love to be able to drive to, say, my local B&N and pick up copies of my books there for distribution.
Again, they add "bookstores" the distribution model, but I am convinced this will work similar to the contract most Pod publisher like Lulu have with Ingram. In store distribution is not guaranteed.
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