The Future of Regional Cookbooks - Part 5

I was recently made aware of a self-publishing business model that at first glance seemed very enticing. The concept was to pay a fixed dollar amount ($5,000 and above) for different levels of marketing support to a company. (I will let you research the names, but there are plenty out there.) The company then formats your book and makes it available for purchase online through their store and pays you a royalty for each book sold. Pretty interesting, I thought.

In trying to understand the concept I did some research by actually calling a few of the companies and getting all of their information. In addition, I developed a list of books that they were selling in their store and called or wrote to some of the authors to inquire how satisfied they were. I was very surprised that most told me they were so dissatisfied that they didn't want to even discuss it. This made me really curious, so I dug into the offerings a bit further.

The premise is built on accumulated sales to a "community" of potential buyers provided by the author at ridiculous price points. For example, a typical 64 page softcover or e-book cookbook was priced at $24.95. Realizing that I have been in this business for 30 years and have had many conversations with clients about the retail value of their books, I was shocked. While the value proposition does not require huge sums of investment dollars most authors get $0 return.

I realize that our own offering (as well as other good competitors I know and respect) requires a significantly greater investment and an element of risk, but it comes with a proven track record of authors actually making money and earning profits through their hard work. Through my career I have gone out of my way to speak highly of reputable competitors as it always sounds like sour grapes if one "knocks" the competition. However in this case, I have to say that these are not cookbook publishing companies-they are technology companies that take your money and give you very little in return.

There are so many success stories in the self-publishing world but in each case there is a great book that was produced. Having a technology company run a spell check is not editing. There are many benefits of a well executed self-publishing strategy including having a quality finished book and making a profit but one should be ready to invest time and money to reap the rewards. Taking the least expensive route, is in my opinion, simply inviting failure.