Print book pricing tool

[Daniel]

I approved the proof for Geomancer's Bargain at CreateSpace today, and the question of pricing came up. It was easy enough to fiddle with the price until I got it right, but I thought it would be nice to have a "what if" tool that was more responsive and that I could use when I'm not on the CS site. So I created an Excel (xls) spreadsheet. I figured I'd offer it here in case anyone else finds it useful.

The screen shot below shows the calculations I made with Geomancer's Bargain. The book costs me $4.54 per unit to print and I'm not using Expanded Distribution, so the discount is 40%. To earn a profit of $3.00 per book, I'd have to charge at least $12.57. I rounded that up to $12.99 and found I'd earn $3.25 per sale.




This next screen shot shows what happens if I'd gone with Expanded Distribution. Changing the discount to 60% means I'd have to charge $18.85 to earn the same $3.00 per unit. My previous retail price of $12.99 would only earn me 66 cents.




Here's a link to the spreadsheet if you'd like to download it.
Print Book Price Calculator.xls (15.5 KB)

Ignore the following image attachments. They duplicate the images shown above.

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[Pru Freda]

Thanks, Daniel. This will come in very useful next time I go into print - given how little I actually make off my only "real" book.

[djmills]

Thanks for your info, Daniel, and the spreadsheet layout.

I came at pricing from a different angle, but with similar outcomes. I decided up to 199 pages would be $12.99, including costs and 60% discount for extended distribution, leaving me a profit of around $2.00+ each sale, because I am selling worldwide and competing with cheaper print books in USA. And I adjust the price upwards on more pages so I still receive around $2.00 each sale.

Diane

[Miss Terri Novelle]

I think I've read where CS seems not to have a huge problem with adding the book a second time to put it in expanded distribution at a higher price. Don't quote me on that because I could be totally off base and I can't remember where I saw the post.

[Daniel]

Apr 23, 2016 18:22:34 GMT -5 djmills said:

Thanks for your info, Daniel, and the spreadsheet layout.

I came at pricing from a different angle, but with similar outcomes. I decided up to 199 pages would be $12.99, including costs and 60% discount for extended distribution, leaving me a profit of around $2.00+ each sale, because I am selling worldwide and competing with cheaper print books in USA. And I adjust the price upwards on more pages so I still receive around $2.00 each sale.

Diane

I termed that approach "price by profit" on the spreadsheet. For your example...
* Print Unit Cost: $3.25 (for 200 pages of B&W interior with cover)
* Distributor Discount: 60% (for Expanded Distribution)
* Profit per Unit: $2.00 (in the yellow cell under the "price by profit" column)

The spreadsheet calculates the following for you, based on the above info:
* Author Royalty: 40%
* Break-even Price: $8.13
* Retail Price: $13.13
* Distributor Share: $11.13

I would do the same thing that you did and "round down" the price to $12.99 for marketing purposes, sacrificing some of the profit per unit. To see how much of a sacrifice that would be, I'd enter $12.99 into the yellow cell under "profit by price" to learn that I'd really make $1.95 from each sale of a 200-page book. Of course, for books with fewer than 200 pages, the unit cost goes down and your profit goes up.

Following the above scenario, here's what the spreadsheet looked like:

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[Daniel]

Apr 24, 2016 8:20:47 GMT -5 Miss Terri Novelle said:

I think I've read where CS seems not to have a huge problem with adding the book a second time to put it in expanded distribution at a higher price. Don't quote me on that because I could be totally off base and I can't remember where I saw the post.

That sounds like a recipe for confusion. Amazon.com and CreateSpace Direct would have two listings for your book at different prices, unless there's some way opt out of those channels when you go with ED. (This CS page indicates otherwise.)

I use Lightning Source for non-Amazon distribution, but if I were starting over as a fiction-only author, I'd probably use ED even though I'm not a fan. Print is less than 1% of my fiction sales anyway, so I don't worry about it.

[Miss Terri Novelle]

I don't bother with it, either. It's just one more pain in the butt thing for the 5 or 10 books I sell a month. Not worth it.