In the case of Fandemonium Volume 2, I am going to choose Price Plan 25. This is the same Price Plan we used for Fandemonium Volume 1 (and that decision was based upon a social media public poll we held in which we offered different pricing scenarios and our social media community chose one. The scenario they chose was a Price Plan of 25%, a $16.95 retail price, and a profit for the American Red Cross of $7.38.
One of the most powerful elements of publishing with Outskirts Press is the flexibility granted to the author regarding pricing and profit. We are one of the only publishers that pay 100% royalties (100% of the profits), but as you can see, the actual “dollars and cents” you receive depends upon three other factors: The Retail Price, The Trade Discount, And the Base Copy Price, or in other words, the single copy production price, of the book.
Most publishers enforce all these prices without giving authors any say in the matter, but you will see from the pie charts below, that can significantly affect YOUR profits and your retail price. At Outskirts Press, we only set the base copy price of the book. The retail price and discount (we call it a “Price Plan”) is up to you, and therefore your PROFITS are up to you.
Book pricing is complicated because everyone has an opinion about what they think “the best” pricing is. So what better way to demonstrate the flexibility of our pricing by allowing our social community the chance to vote on the Pricing Option they liked best for our first Facebook Anthology, Fandemonium?
Below are 4 different pricing options we offered.
Pricing Option 1 has a retail price of $16.95, a price plan of 25, and a profit of $7.38 for The American Red Cross every time a book sells. This is the price plan we recommend for this book. Even though we give the power to the author, we always make recommendations to help the author select the best pricing for his or her goals.
Pricing Option 2 also has a retail price of $16.95, but has a price plan of 50. This means 50% of the retail price goes to the wholesalers and retailers who are involved in selling the book (Ingram, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, etc.). As a result, the profit for the American Red Cross is lower ($3.16). Physical bookstores often require significant portions of the retail price in order to be compelled to consider selling the book, but online sites like Amazon and Barnes & Noble don’t.
Pricing Option 3 demonstrates the powerful flexibility of publishing with Outskirts Press. Yes, you can set the retail price for this particular book as low as $7.95. But you will notice the majority of the “pie” goes toward the production cost of the book ($5.33) as a result. Even with Ingram/Amazon only getting $1.99, that leaves only 63 cents of “author profit” for The American Red Cross. Since the “pie” is smaller ($7.95 instead of $16.95) all the pieces are smaller, too, with the exception of the production price, which stays the same regardless of anything else.
Pricing Option 4 has a lower retail price of $12.95 and a Price Plan of 25. The base copy price is the same in every scenario, which leaves $3.24 for wholesalers/retailers and $4.38 for The American Red Cross.
Based upon these choices, our social community chose Option 1 for Fandemonium, and that’s the option we’re choosing for Volume 2, as well (although since Volume 2 is slightly longer, the profit earned will be slightly less).
President of Outskirts Press 