Winning Pony Print Mk. II - Important Pricing Update · 2:54am Mar 25th, 2017
Hey everyone,
Comma here again. I've been doing some number-crunching with the new wave of orders, and now that I have a better feel for the costs, I wanted to give everyone an updated estimate. The initial estimate came in a little under, and--
Boo!
Yeah, I know, the new price is going to be higher than the $47 USD I estimated earlier. Here's the rough breakdown as to why:
Egad! Those are some big numbers!
This process isn't cheap, yeah. It was even worse last time with two books, which I am never doing again at the same time. One at a time maybe, but... Ulg.
Anyway, the numbers under Estimate 1 are (duh) my initial estimate, and obviously going that route isn't feasible without putting myself hundreds of dollars in the red. Thus, the new estimate for orders is going to be around $55 USD per book for orders inside the United States, and a bit more past that for international orders.
Explain these numbers! EXPLAIN! EXPLAIN!
The above screenshot shows an example of both domestic and international shipping, including the initial price estimate for both, the cost of shipping, totals, and more. (Blue for domestic, green for international, red for the Renegade option to destroy the Reapers and all synthetic life.)
The initial pricing covered the per-unit cost of printing the book and shipping it to me, as well as what I thought would be the shipping from me to you guys. Unfortunately, I realized that would not include PayPal's 4% transaction fee, which takes a bothersome-sized bite out of everyone's payment.
On top of that, there's a higher percentage of international orders this time around, which means that while the price of shipping hasn't changed, the overall cost of shipping has. Domestic shipping is still fairly cheap, but Estimate 1 relied on that too heavily to offset international orders.
So how much will international orders be?
Still TBD, but probably around $7 to $10 more.
Are those the final prices?
I hope so, but I won’t know until we close orders. I’ll keep you in the loop via Chengar’s blog as things progress.
I might not be able to afford that.
I can understand that. I hope everyone can afford this, but if you have to back out of ordering, just delete your reservation on the Order Form blog post. I haven’t placed the order yet, so there’s no commitment at this point.
I can still afford this!
You look particularly handsome today, Comma.
Why thank you, Hypothetical Reader.
Enough of your Straw Man! I have a question that wasn't answered here.
Post it in the comments below! I'll answer them as they come along.
If the cost is over $50, I'm going to need some time to re-organize my finances. How long do I have to work it out?
4471099
I'll PM you shortly.
Have y'all considered just putting this thing up on Lulu and letting people deal with their own ordering and shipping and such?
This seems like an awful lot of rigamarole for a method of printing that's really only economical if you're doing four digit print runs.
4471150
Per my previous notes, I'm wary of getting C&D'd by Hasbro. Maybe after this run, but for right now I want to finish this out before looking into anything else.
4471180 iisaw prints their books through Lulu. Have yet to hear anything from them about a C&D. Perhaps talk with them about there experience? I've been meaning to order a copy of each. Never remember these things are up there waiting to be ordered.
Do we have to transfer our filthy foreign money into $US? I only ask, because the Australian Dollar is very weak at the moment and this might drive the price way about $50. This might be a problem seeing as I am only buying this second copy because I bought the first books for my sister, and would prefer to have a copy for myself as well.
4471380
I just checked Lulu's book creation page. The maximum number of pages they can put into a 6x9 book is 800, and this version of Life and Times is 31 pages over.
I'll look into setting up something more permanent with them after I finish this run, but one thing at a time.
4471452
I'll PM you shortly.
4471150 I have a copy of Twilight's List, which was also printed through Book1One. I also have all three of iisaw's books through Lulu.
My verdict: Lulu's price vs quality ratio is great, but it just falls flat when comparing it to a dedicated print run.
That said however, the nice thing about Lulu is that it's okay to "miss out" initially (it's really thanks to Comma-Kazie that I'm in on this one in the first place), and people outside the US get free shipping coupons regularly, so it's usually cheaper in the long run for them.
Ideally, it's fine to have a dedicated print run once in a while, especially for something this big, but for a large portion of fics (say, up to 200k words), Lulu is fine for me (split volumes don't count, I mean it's still a single fic) because of the ease and, if you are patient like me, non-issue of shipping costs.
4471380 On Lulu, the author can set a commission fee (or something) so they make money. As far as I'm aware, none of the authors is actually doing (it's not really hard to check, just create your own book with the same specs and pages) that. Plus, iisaw doesn't have them publicly searchable either. The only way to get there is via the links on his blogpost, at which point any sane person should be aware that it's not official merchandise.
I dont understand why international orders seem to be 7-10 $ more for the books them self if the only thing we really need to pay more for is the shipping oO or am i missunderstanding something
4472526
Outbound shipping is the primary reason international orders are more expensive. The Book1One total includes production, taxes, shipping, and a 10% discount (which is the only reason I'm in the green as it is). The 'Postage' column in the first picture refers to shipping from me to readers, and it's about 7x cheaper to ship a book here in the U.S.
I've actually tried to balance out the pricing so that everyone's paying more-or-less the same amount and I don't break the bank for anyone ordering outside the U.S., but even with that I still have to ask for more from international readers.
4472901 ok so the estimate 1collume is including shipping? Thats what i was confused about because it looks like this to me
domestic orders 47$ base price for the book + 4$ shipping = 51$ total
international orders 53$ base price for the book + 35$ shipping = 88$ total
So it is more like 55$total domestic and 65$total international?
4473120
Shipping to me from Book1One, yes, as well as from me to the people placing the order. Like I said, the 'Postage' column is just my reference for the pricing to ship from me to everyone else.
That's the new current estimate, yes. I'll have the final price this time tomorrow.
Just for clarification, does that $55 bucks include shipping? I can handle my orders if that ($55 USD) price per book is the entire cost, but not if there is anything else on top of it.
4473620
Correct, that price does include shipping. The $55 US/$65 international is the only thing you need to pay.
4473791
Cool. Thanks.
4472312 The Celestia Code (both hardcover and casewrap) is searchable, but the others aren't.