As I mentioned yesterday, I have been working on a couple books in my spare time and with the Internet now there are a ton of self-publishing options. One of the services that really impressed me was iUniverse.Com which for a reasonable fee will make your book available for sale both online and as a traditional paper book that is printed on demand.
One of the major selling points of iUniverse.Com is that the mega-book retailer Barnes & Noble owns 49 percent of the the company and on its site, iUniverse.Com touts that it has…
…the most extensive distribution system available; books published by iUniverse.com are available for order at fine bookstores such as Barnes & Noble, amazon.com, bn.com, Borders, and thousands of other traditional & online outlets
Ironically, though, it turns out that many Barnes & Noble stores will not order books for customers that are published through iUniverse.Com. According to this Wired story, many authors who use the service have had potential buyers tell them that their local Barnes and Noble won’t order the book since iUniverse only gives bookstores a 30 percent discount compared to the traditional 45 to 50 percent that most publishers give.
This is especially bizarre since all of the Barnes & Noble stores I have been in over the past year or so have a little display touting iUniverse, usually in the reference section where they stock guides to writing.
The article also notes that some Barnes & Noble stores report 4-6 week turnaround times from iUniverse, which really makes the whole point of the service moot. If it is going to take 4-6 weeks to get the book, the advantage of the iUniverse system disappears — you might as well self-publish and sell the books from your own web site.
Source:
Black Hole in Writers’ Universe? M.J. Rose, Wired News, September 12, 2000.