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Beachwalk Press
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I love the covers. In my opinion, all except "Embracing the Unexpected" look like quality products, especially considering this is a small press.
Their 'about us' page is questionable at best though. There's only information about one person working for the company, and that's Pamela Tyner, the publisher and editor-in-chief. It says that she's both an experienced author and editor, but gives no further credentials. To me, this is a bit of a red flag. She shows no credentials in the publishing business, and being a good editor doesn't automatically make you a good publisher either. Plus, there's no sign of anyone else working for the company. She may have some freelancers working with her now that we don't know of though. But one-man businesses are doomed to fail. If the person in charge gets ill for a week or more, business stops running like usual, and this can be quite catastrophic.
I took a look at their 'employment opportunities', but it looks like they're not hiring anyone. If they aren't, then they can safely delete that page, or add the people they've already hired to their 'about us' page. It would give me more confidence in the company if it was more than one person doing things behind the screens.
Their 'submissions' page bothers me as well. For starters, they currently publish 4-6 books a month, which is an awful lot, especially for such a small press. Their goal however is to publish eight books a month. I'm very worried about this. Either their behind-screen team is a lot bigger than they let on from their 'about us' page, or they hardly give each book the time it deserves. I also don't see any mention of publicity for the book anywhere, so I'm not sure if they even tackle that. On top of that, they try to have six months from submission to publiciation. That's short. I can understand it for the short stories (15k words) but for an actual novel that's a bit surprising.
Their royalties are 45% on eBooks.
Their 'about us' page is questionable at best though. There's only information about one person working for the company, and that's Pamela Tyner, the publisher and editor-in-chief. It says that she's both an experienced author and editor, but gives no further credentials. To me, this is a bit of a red flag. She shows no credentials in the publishing business, and being a good editor doesn't automatically make you a good publisher either. Plus, there's no sign of anyone else working for the company. She may have some freelancers working with her now that we don't know of though. But one-man businesses are doomed to fail. If the person in charge gets ill for a week or more, business stops running like usual, and this can be quite catastrophic.
I took a look at their 'employment opportunities', but it looks like they're not hiring anyone. If they aren't, then they can safely delete that page, or add the people they've already hired to their 'about us' page. It would give me more confidence in the company if it was more than one person doing things behind the screens.
Their 'submissions' page bothers me as well. For starters, they currently publish 4-6 books a month, which is an awful lot, especially for such a small press. Their goal however is to publish eight books a month. I'm very worried about this. Either their behind-screen team is a lot bigger than they let on from their 'about us' page, or they hardly give each book the time it deserves. I also don't see any mention of publicity for the book anywhere, so I'm not sure if they even tackle that. On top of that, they try to have six months from submission to publiciation. That's short. I can understand it for the short stories (15k words) but for an actual novel that's a bit surprising.
Their royalties are 45% on eBooks.
I suspect that's because the 'credentials' are questionable at best. A quick google brings up her author site where she's got an out of print New Concepts book and a novella with a publisher I've never heard of called Whispers Publishing. So...not exactly an impressive resume - a deeply troubled, many would say scam, epublisher and another that's so small I've never even heard of them.
I really don't like when publishers claim being an author gives them any insight into being a publisher, to be honest. I've got over 20 ebooks under my belt, with many of the top tier epubs, and I wouldn't have the first clue how to begin acting as a publisher. Being published doesn't teach me how to be a publisher.
I have heard of this press before, though, and I recall being nearly blinded by all the red flags thrown up when I heard how their acquisitions process works. If anyone would like to PM me privately, I'll be happy to share what little I know.
I was wondering how long it would take before we showed up over here 
You're right in that being an author does not qualify you to be a publisher (and by the way, I haven’t written anything in years, although some day when I have the time, I will return to writing, which is why I’ve kept my personal website). I was an editor at Lyrical Press for a number of years, then became their managing editor (I managed both the content editors and the line editors), and was their acting EIC when they were between EICs. I worked with books all the way from the submission process to the production process.
If you would like to see some of the authors I edited for at Lyrical, you can visit my Facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/pamelatyner) and view the photo album titled “books I’ve edited”. If you know any of the authors (and I think some of them used to be active here—not sure if they still are), I’m sure they will verify that I was both professional and knowledgeable.
I do need to add the staff to the “about us” page, and it is on my to-do list. I certainly am not the only person working for the company (I couldn’t do it all alone).
We’re not currently publishing 4-6 books a month. Hopefully we will be soon, but right now we’re just not receiving enough in the way of quality submissions (we’re a new publisher, and people are leery of that, which I certainly understand, plus lots of authors are now choosing to self-publish). We released 4 books our first month (which was July 2011) and since then we’ve been releasing 2 books per month.
As far as publicity, we’ve done some online ads, and we have ads coming out in the June issue of RT (a half-page ad) and in the July issue of RT (a full-page ad). We’re looking at other advertising possibilities as well.
Our acquisitions process works like many other epublishers—people submit, we read the submission and then either accept, reject, or send a request for a revise and resubmit. Nothing beyond that. We do not request exclusives, but we do ask that you advise us if it is a simultaneous submission.
Our goal is to publish books within 6 months of contract, and so far we haven’t had a problem meeting that, but certainly if necessary we would take longer, because we wouldn’t rush a book through the process and release it before it was ready.
We do send our books out for review to approximately 35 review sites.
We pay 45% of sales. Royalties are paid 4 times a year and are paid on time J Our authors have the option of being paid via check or paypal.
Our books are currently available for sale at our website, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, All Romance eBooks, BookStrand, and Coffee Time Romance Book Store.
I hope that answered some of your questions. If you have any additional questions, please feel free to email me at [email protected]
You're right in that being an author does not qualify you to be a publisher (and by the way, I haven’t written anything in years, although some day when I have the time, I will return to writing, which is why I’ve kept my personal website). I was an editor at Lyrical Press for a number of years, then became their managing editor (I managed both the content editors and the line editors), and was their acting EIC when they were between EICs. I worked with books all the way from the submission process to the production process.
If you would like to see some of the authors I edited for at Lyrical, you can visit my Facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/pamelatyner) and view the photo album titled “books I’ve edited”. If you know any of the authors (and I think some of them used to be active here—not sure if they still are), I’m sure they will verify that I was both professional and knowledgeable.
I do need to add the staff to the “about us” page, and it is on my to-do list. I certainly am not the only person working for the company (I couldn’t do it all alone).
We’re not currently publishing 4-6 books a month. Hopefully we will be soon, but right now we’re just not receiving enough in the way of quality submissions (we’re a new publisher, and people are leery of that, which I certainly understand, plus lots of authors are now choosing to self-publish). We released 4 books our first month (which was July 2011) and since then we’ve been releasing 2 books per month.
As far as publicity, we’ve done some online ads, and we have ads coming out in the June issue of RT (a half-page ad) and in the July issue of RT (a full-page ad). We’re looking at other advertising possibilities as well.
Our acquisitions process works like many other epublishers—people submit, we read the submission and then either accept, reject, or send a request for a revise and resubmit. Nothing beyond that. We do not request exclusives, but we do ask that you advise us if it is a simultaneous submission.
Our goal is to publish books within 6 months of contract, and so far we haven’t had a problem meeting that, but certainly if necessary we would take longer, because we wouldn’t rush a book through the process and release it before it was ready.
We do send our books out for review to approximately 35 review sites.
We pay 45% of sales. Royalties are paid 4 times a year and are paid on time J Our authors have the option of being paid via check or paypal.
Our books are currently available for sale at our website, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, All Romance eBooks, BookStrand, and Coffee Time Romance Book Store.
I hope that answered some of your questions. If you have any additional questions, please feel free to email me at [email protected]
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Hey Pamela,
Thanks for coming here and explaining more about your publishing company.
This in particular troubles me though:
Publicity doesn't mean buying ads. Publicity means scheduling blog tours, sending the book to reviewers, schedule guest posts for the author, contests, setting up stuff like book trailers and bookmarks (not always necessary, but just giving examples) and basically gaining publicity for the book. Ads alone will probably not do much in terms of publicity. Do you have a publicist on board? They would probably know that publicity means more than just buying ads. If not, I strongly suggest you go find one for your company. What you're talking about here is advertising, not publicity.
I noticed that you did mention you send your book to 35 review sites. While that's good, the number isn't that impressive to me. If you take a look at the book blogger community, many with a website where they review books, you'll notice that there are hundreds if not thousands of those blogs out there. Targeting review only sites is a good start, but if you expand your network and target these blogs, you might reach a larger audience.
Thanks for coming here and explaining more about your publishing company.
This in particular troubles me though:
Publicity doesn't mean buying ads. Publicity means scheduling blog tours, sending the book to reviewers, schedule guest posts for the author, contests, setting up stuff like book trailers and bookmarks (not always necessary, but just giving examples) and basically gaining publicity for the book. Ads alone will probably not do much in terms of publicity. Do you have a publicist on board? They would probably know that publicity means more than just buying ads. If not, I strongly suggest you go find one for your company. What you're talking about here is advertising, not publicity.
I noticed that you did mention you send your book to 35 review sites. While that's good, the number isn't that impressive to me. If you take a look at the book blogger community, many with a website where they review books, you'll notice that there are hundreds if not thousands of those blogs out there. Targeting review only sites is a good start, but if you expand your network and target these blogs, you might reach a larger audience.
I was wondering how long it would take before we showed up over here
Thanks for taking the time to come here and post. BTW, I do love Beachwalk's covers.
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aimeeduffyx
Registered
Eternalised, most publishing companies I come across don't actually do so much as buy ads, let alone put the authors on tours. Obviously your comment was from last year and Beachwalk do so much more now including sending the books to a very impressive list of reviewers
I've been with Beachwalk Press for almost a year (and three releases later) and can say that they are fabulous. All the authors are thrilled with everything Beachwalk do for us. The editors who work for them are always around to answer questions, regardless of how silly, and so is Pamela herself.
They regularly participate in promotions with Coffee Time Romance and other retailers as well as do sales and events that help all their authors.
I'll always write for Beachwalk for as long as they'll have me
I've been with Beachwalk Press for almost a year (and three releases later) and can say that they are fabulous. All the authors are thrilled with everything Beachwalk do for us. The editors who work for them are always around to answer questions, regardless of how silly, and so is Pamela herself.
They regularly participate in promotions with Coffee Time Romance and other retailers as well as do sales and events that help all their authors.
I'll always write for Beachwalk for as long as they'll have me
dondomat
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Very true, concerning the small epub level. To paraphrase an earlier post, I also have a half a dozen small epublishers 'under my belt'
and what they have in common is that their only well-sellers on Amazon are bodice-rippers and ab-ripplers, so that should bode well for this publisher, as they appear to focus only on this, without spreading themselves around too thinly on various genres.
aimeeduffyx
Registered
I suppose only being with two epublishers doesn't give me a broad spectrum to comment, but I have heard a few comments about other big epublishers and am happy with the houses I work with.
Lol re bodice rippers and ab ripplers. Though none of my covers have either, even the erotic ones
Lol re bodice rippers and ab ripplers. Though none of my covers have either, even the erotic ones
I've worked with several publishers, but Beachwalk Press will always be a place I return to. They're small, yes. But they get to know the authors, and they help promote. They are working on growing. I was just at a convention with the publisher, and we sponsored a breakfast. The press also let's the authors have a book tour for their titles, which many small presses don't do--or at least in my experience when I've ventured away from Beachwalk.