How the Paperback Transformed an Industry

[SquidInk]

http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/137715

Here’s a little perspective: In 1939, gas cost 10 cents a gallon at the pump. A movie ticket set you back 20 cents. John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, the year’s bestselling hardcover book, was .75. For a nation suffering 20 percent unemployment, books were an impossible expense.

[...]

If paperbacks were going to succeed in America, they would need a new model. De Graff, for his part, was well acquainted with the economics of books. He knew that printing costs were high because volumes were low—an average hardcover print run of 10,000 might cost 40 cents per copy. With only 500 bookstores in the U.S., most located in major cities, low demand was baked into the equation.

In the U.K., things were different. There, four years prior, Penguin Books founder Allen Lane had started publishing popular titles with paper bindings and distributed them in train stations and department stores. In his first year of operation, Lane sold more than three million “mass-market” paperbacks.

Quantity was key. De Graff knew that if he could print 100,000 paperbound books, production costs would plummet to 10 cents per copy. But it would be impossible for Pocket Books to turn a profit if it couldn’t reach hundreds of thousands of readers. And that would never happen as long as de Graff relied solely on bookstores for distribution. So de Graff devised a plan to get his books into places where books weren’t traditionally sold. His twist? Using magazine distributors to place Pocket Books in newsstands, subway stations, drugstores, and other outlets to reach the underserved suburban and rural populace. But if Pocket Books were going to sell, they couldn’t just stick to the highbrow. De Graff avoided the stately, color-coded covers of European paperbacks, which lacked graphics other than the publishers’ logos, and splashed colorful, eye-catching drawings on his books.

Even with the success of Pocket Books’ test run, hardcover publishers scoffed at the idea of paperbacks for the masses. Still, they were more than willing to sell Pocket Books the reprint rights to their hardcover titles, if only to humor de Graff. “We feel we ought to give it a chance—to show that it won’t work here,” an anonymous publisher told Time shortly after Pocket Books’ launch. For every paperback sold, the hardcover publisher would receive a penny royalty per copy—which it split fifty-fifty with the author. Pocket Books would also make about a penny in profit for each copy sold.

Since de Graff offered refunds for unsold copies, carrying the books was a no-brainer. In 1939, de Graff told Publishers Weekly that he’d been deluged with requests from “out-of-town dealers.” And from the get-go Americans devoured every 25-cent paperback de Graff could feed them. By the time Pocket Books sold its 100 millionth copy in September 1944, its books could be found in more than 70,000 outlets across the U.S. They might not have had the glamour and sophistication of hardcovers, but paperbacks were making serious money. It wasn’t long before other publishers decided to jump into the game.

It's always about distribution. And cover art. At some point after that content begins to matter.

[Dale O Sea]

http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/137715

It's always about distribution. And cover art. At some point after that content begins to matter.

It's always about the money first..then those other things you mention.

But..

Ebooks are the new game-changer. After recently starting to read on a Kindle Fire, I'm pretty much done with paper books and my eyes are thanking me profusely. I know that many long-time readers aren't quick to accept ebooks but in time these will dominate the market for students and pleasure readers alike. They are simply more portable, easier to use, much better to see and read and - bottom line -> cheaper to market.

[Fan]

but there are almost zero ebooks compared to what is available in print... for some things they are fine but almost nothing I look for is available.

You know what suits the e-format amazingly well? Magazines.

That being said I have hundreds of books on my Aldiko bookshelf.

[Fan]

So does the original post explain stuff like Shades of grey?

[Dale O Sea]

but there are almost zero ebooks compared to what is available in print... for some things they are fine but almost nothing I look for is available.

You know what suits the e-format amazingly well? Magazines.

That being said I have hundreds of books on my Aldiko bookshelf.

That will change. The problem isn't with the tech, it's with the rights holders. Google wanted to scan public domain books and got a bunch of them done..then families of the authors stopped it. There will be more, especially as print books lose out in a price/cost war. It's so much cheaper to get an ebook to the customer.

[Fan]

That will change. The problem isn't with the tech, it's with the rights holders. Google wanted to scan public domain books and got a bunch of them done..then families of the authors stopped it. There will be more, especially as print books lose out in a price/cost war. It's so much cheaper to get an ebook to the customer.

Is it really cheaper? I wonder... I'd like to see real numbers on that. The price of ebooks certainly doesn't show the end user that they are cheaper. The actual cost of printing a book is not that high, and all the technology, DRM, server and software stuff that has to happen for an ebook could easily push it into the same price range. The majority of the prices go to royalties, publishing fees for the publisher and so on. Very much like music, artists are not making more per song now than before...

[Dale O Sea]

Is it really cheaper? I wonder... I'd like to see real numbers on that. The price of ebooks certainly doesn't show the end user that they are cheaper. The actual cost of printing a book is not that high, and all the technology, DRM, server and software stuff that has to happen for an ebook could easily push it into the same price range. The majority of the prices go to royalties, publishing fees for the publisher and so on. Very much like music, artists are not making more per song now than before...

Good stuff here:

http://www.ehow.com/about_6705343_e_boo ... lysis.html

Might be numbers if you follow the links. But we are both right from what I read..depends on who you ask, heh.

[Fan]

Also, I will not buy a book with DRM on it, so that cuts out most of the market. I also will not use PDFs for books. Both those options are ridiculous to me if I can just buy the book.

I think the truth of what ebooks cost is well hidden by the publishers so we don't realize they are ripping us off big time.

I have spent at least 1k this year buying second hand "real" books, and I don't intend to stop.

[Fan]

This basically tells the story I am alluding to http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-574125 ... t-so-much/ - like everything else in this world it is a scam.

[Dale O Sea]

This basically tells the story I am alluding to http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-574125 ... t-so-much/ - like everything else in this world it is a scam.

I like it! They pin it on iTunes/Apple.

It's always the money..always. I think I've typed that about 3 times today - a new record for me.