CreateSpace vs. Ingram Spark

Any of you following along will know I am trying to self-publish a Print-On-Demand (POD) genealogy reference book on my family in particular. I had decided to use Amazon’s CreateSpace because so many people suggested it and it has been around a while. What I found was that because of the length of my book, I could NOT use CreateSpace (more on that below), and so I went over to Lightning Source, another POD company people had suggested. Lightning Source’s POD arm for small or self-publishers is called IngramSpark.

The following comparison of the two resources is necessarily incomplete, as I could not complete the process with CreateSpace and have not yet completed the process with IngramSpark. But it’s what I have found so far.

CreateSpace is very easy to use. However, I found their Submission Guidelines to be missing or misleading in key areas. When reading how to format your book’s interior, it tells you the gutter margin for 3 different pages count ranges, all the way up to 1,000 pages. What they don’t tell you anywhere in the Submission Guidelines (it can be found elsewhere on the website) is that there are maximum page limitations based on trim size and color vs. black and white options. Based on their Page Count table, the maximum number of pages anywhere is 828 (not 1,000) and if you choose to do full color, 480 is your limit. My full-color book, unfortunately, is 508 pages. Due to the nature of the content, there is no way I can cut 30 pages out. Which is why I went to IngramSpark. (I did confirm with CreateSpace customer service that I was correct and I COULD NOT print this book with them.)

IngramSpark is also not difficult to use. However, it will require more money for you to get started. At this point in the process, I have run across several fees:

  • $49 one-time set-up fee per book (waived if you have a 50 book drop order within a certain amount of time after setting up your book)
  • $11 annual distribution fee (if you are simply printing for your family and do not want distribution, this fee is waived)
  • ISBN fee. IngramSpark requires you provide your own ISBN number. You can purchase one for $125, or you can purchase batches of them for less per unit through Bowker. CreateSpace allows you to either use an Amazon ID number (not the same as an ISBN) or to purchase an ISBN through them (I think it was $10) or to provide your own.

So it is more expensive to use IngramSpark. The question you need to ask yourself is: Can I make my book fit CreateSpace’s limitations in a way that will not compromise the book’s quality? In my case, because I have a lot of photos and documents and charts, the answer was “no.”

The actual interior design process is the same–upload a PDF to their website. I will say that IngramSpark’s gutter margins are MUCH smaller than CreateSpace’s, probably due to manufacturing differences, which allows me to have larger photos and charts.

I have not used the cover designer for either system yet, so cannot know how they compare. I also don’t know about the quality of the final product or the tracking and royalty payment facets, since I haven’t finished the book yet.

Having to switch to IngramSpark has set me back, because with the much smaller gutter margins I need to re-size all my photos, graphs, etc. The text, of course, was easy to readjust. Still, I am pleased that I have an outlet to get this book out there in the way I envisioned it, instead of having to present it in a non-optimal way to force it into CreateSpace’s limitations.

I am slowly exploring this self-publishing world, both in ebook and now POD. It’s a fascinating journey! I will bring more info on IngramSpark after I have completed the process and have more to share.

Have you done POD? What has your experience been?

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Smashword-ing: Another step forward

This past week I took another small step up the writing career ladder. I posted a short story, TO LIGHT AND GUARD, for sale on Smashwords. I am now a millionaire and can retire.

Okay, I drifted off into fantasy for a minute there.

Seriously, this seemingly minor step of posting a short story for sale is a big step in the psychological progression of my career. I have been published, but never for pay. So the moment I sold my first copy of this story, I became a professional author, because someone purchased something I wrote. (Definitions of “professional author” vary from writer to writer–this is mine.)

Celebrate!

Posting to Smashwords was painstaking but not technically difficult–at least, not for a geek like me. If you find it too hard to follow their incredibly thorough Style Guide, they will provide you with a list of people you can pay to format your book. Basically, what Smashwords needs is a file with all the auto-formatting stripped away, then selective formatting put back in strategically. Like I said, painstaking, but not terribly hard.

So now my story is up on Smashwords in all formats. It has not yet been distributed to all other channels, such as Sony and Apple, but should be this week sometime. Amazon is another issue altogether. Apparently, Smashwords has to manually upload their files into Amazon, which as you can imagine takes a lot of time. As a result, Smashwords requires $2,000 in sales on their site/other distributors before they will upload your book to Amazon. So unless 2,000 of my blog readers are willing to pony up the $0.99 for the book to get me there, I will need to look into how to post my story to Amazon separately.

I am extremely excited to have taken this step in my career. I am using this short story as a learning experience (as well as hoping for some sales!) both technically and marketing-wise. I am having fun with it and hoping to have other short stories to join it eventually.

A small step, perhaps. But a long journey is accomplished one step at a time.

What steps (small or large) are you celebrating in your career right now?

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