The economics of publishing
Today's photograph is by Roger Tiley capturing Mr Coles outside what was his miners' two up down cottage in Abercarn, in South Wales, in 1983. The mine has just closed and the demolition crew have moved in to remove all traces of a once-proud community.
In this post, Image and Reality’s Colin Wilkinson talks about the economics of crowd funding and publishing, as Coal Faces reaches its funding target on Kickstarter.
Good news day - we have reached the target for Coal Faces. With eight days to go, there is the opportunity to add to the total -so all pledges are very welcome.
I am often asked about the cost of publishing and how Kickstarter works - so here goes. First the cost of publishing a book like Coal Faces (c.200 pages printed CMYK with a print run of 400 hardback and 500 softcover). There are three bands of cost: editorial (photography/text): design: print. Print is the easiest to pin down - we are looking at around £8k for 900 copies with a hardback/soft cover split. Design is a movable feast but I work to a figure of £1.5k. The 'controversial' element is the editorial side. I have highlighted the word controversial because - over the years - I have heard so many horror stories of photographers paying significant sums to have their work published. I don't see this as an ethical publishing model - I have never charged a photographer for having their work published and never will. As a publisher, if I have confidence in a body of work, it is my responsibility to find the funding to make the book happen. Additionally, the content provider must be rewarded for their work although royalty payments rarely amount to much today, with average sales of photobooks rarely exceeding 1000 copies. If I add £3k in royalties to the cost of the book, we have a total of around £12.5k for a book like Coal Faces. (There are small additional costs such a warehousing but these are publishers' costs that are essentially fixed costs of running a business).
So how does the Kickstarter model work. We set £12k as a target to cover most of the costs. Kickstarter take a fee of 8% (5% commission and 3% to cover card payment costs). On £12k that is just under £1k. Postage costs are included in the total figure - which will be about £1200 for the 240 pledges. Reward prints, packaging adds another £600 - leaving about £9200 to cover book production, so we are short by just over £3k although full royalties are only payable once the book sells out.
This is a tight balancing act and nobody is going to get rich but at least one important photobook will see the light of day and hopefully change minds - and it is your generosity that has made it happen and I can't thank you all enough. I have made so many friends on Kickstarter over the years - it really is a positive force in building up like-minded communities - and I hope you enjoy my posts about photography and publishing.
Today's photograph is by Roger Tiley capturing Mr Coles outside what was his miners' two up down cottage in Abercarn, in South Wales, in 1983. The mine has just closed and the demolition crew have moved in to remove all traces of a once-proud community.