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Morgan James Publishing

victoriastrauss

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Authors don't "lose" rights when they publish commercially. They sell rights. Once the book goes out of print, they can get those rights back. Encouraging authors to believe that they will lose rights with "traditional" publishers is a common sales tactic in the vanity publishing world.

Plenty of books don't earn out their advances. But many do. With smaller advances, there's a better chance of that happening. (And advances don't have to be earned out for the publisher to turn a profit.) Also, if I sell my rights for $1,500, I'm $1,500 ahead, whereas a Morgan James author starts out $4,995 behind. I would guess that on average, commercially-published authors have a better chance of earning out their advances than vanity-published authors do of recouping their investments.

Profit margins in publishing certainly tend to be small. But I am skeptical--to put it mildly--of your assertion that publishers lose money on 94% of the books they publish. I'd love to see a citation for this statement.

- Victoria
 

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I used to work as an editor, and the company I worked for made money on just about every title it produced. If it had lost money on 94% of the titles it would have swiftly stopped trading. Publishers just cannot run at that rate of loss and still survive--it's not possible.

I, too, would love to see the study that has made this claim.
 

priceless1

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I recommend reading Galleycat here and here.

publishers actually loose money on 94% of the books published each year. Our collaborative approach is a win win for both the author and the publisher. We share in the profits and like most traditional publishers bear the bulk of the risk. Certainly doesn't mean self publishing. We are very picky about which books we will accept. I'd bet that the 3,800 authors we turned down last year don't feel like we were a self publishing house.
Not to pick nits here, but if I lost money on 94% of my titles, I'd be out of business - and good riddance to boot. If I'm that bad at making good choices, then I have no business being in the business. I doubt these figures.

Here's my basic argument for vanity presses. Authors pay to play. This means that the publisher has no risk. The more services a publisher offers, the more the package costs. Given this, I have a hard time buying your assertions that your collaborative approach is a win-win. Ingram Distribution Services isn't cracked up to what they claim to be because they don't accept every title for distribution. What happens if the author's book isn't one of the lucky ones? And, ultimately, who eats the losses if a book doesn't sell? Since the author shelled out big bucks to your company, I'm willing to bet your company isn't taking a huge hit. Not at those prices.
 
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Harris

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I would never pay to publish. However, there are plenty of places that state publishers lose money on the majority of titles. Maybe Priceless should show them how it's done.

“We estimate that out of every 10 hardcover adult books, seven lose money, two break even and one is a hit,” he said. “So, of course, this business is secretive about sales. Would you want to tell the world that 70% of your output is losing money?”


http://articles.latimes.com/2007/feb/14/entertainment/et-booksales14

''Everyone is reading the same 20 books,'' Paul Slovak, the associate publisher of Viking, complains -- a problem most attribute to the shrinking press coverage for new books. ''It's become a winner-take-all situation.'' Especially for genres that rely heavily on reviews to drive sales, like fiction, the toll is grim.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpa...BA25754C0A9629C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all

Deciding to publish a book is an expensive and time-consuming process, and the chances of a book failing to make a profit are very high. In fact, most books lose money. It is only the books that end up being highly successful that compensate for the losses.
 

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I think that may be true for a few companies that have that business model. (i.e. high input very large commercial presses like the equivalent to big hollywood studios) I suspect is is not true for publishing as a whole. I doubt reliable figures exist on this but many presses simply do not have any enormous hits, just a stable of steady niche earners. Others are low input across the board and structured so they the go into the black after 50 sales per title--generalisations really don't apply well across houses.

But, accurate or not, it seems odd to me to characterise publishing as a lottery where the house doesn't even win, and then suggest paying $5000 up front is a good idea? My average novella makes only about $1000 but costs me only my time so I, as the author, enter the black at sale 1.
 

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I would never pay to publish. However, there are plenty of places that state publishers lose money on the majority of titles. Maybe Priceless should show them how it's done.
Keep in mind that I'm a small publisher, and publish far fewer books than the large guys. Still, 94% is an unreasonable and suspect number.
 

victoriastrauss

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“We estimate that out of every 10 hardcover adult books, seven lose money, two break even and one is a hit,” he said. “So, of course, this business is secretive about sales. Would you want to tell the world that 70% of your output is losing money?”

http://articles.latimes.com/2007/feb/14/entertainment/et-booksales14

It should be noted that the quote above comes not from a publisher, but from Albert Greco, described in the article as "a Fordham University economist who analyzes business trends in the book world."

- Victoria
 

IceCreamEmpress

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“We estimate... 70% of your output is losing money?”

The guy who's "estimating" this is not someone who's actually in the publishing business.

Whoops, Victoria beat me to this. But seriously, nobody who's actually in publishing generates these particular numbers (and look how it dropped from "94%" to "70%" depending on which person-outside-the-industry is doing the estimating!)
 

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“We estimate that out of every 10 hardcover adult books, seven lose money, two break even and one is a hit,” he said. “So, of course, this business is secretive about sales. Would you want to tell the world that 70% of your output is losing money?”
I suspect, though cannot prove, that this is in the vein of an Urban Legend. If it isn't, whose estimate is it and on what/whose figures is it based?

The statistics alone speak against this being a probable scenario. The "hit" books would have to cover costs for their own publication, the break even books, and the vast hidden "no profit" books. What if in a given year they acquire no "hit" books? Do they drown in a sea of red ink? No.

I doubt these figures. Is some creative accounting at work? Hollywood is well known to do this--writing an actor a contract that assures him 2% "of profit" and then incurring so many paper expenses that a movie which earns a gajillion dollars somehow never makes a profit.

Color me skeptical, or inquisitive -- your choice.
 

victoriastrauss

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Those statistics also ignore the backlist--those always-in-print books that generate income year after year (some backlist books sell more copies in a year than current "hit" books do). The backlist accounts for a large portion of a publisher's profit. One of the great values of a hit book is that it can become a backlist book--a steady moneymaker that can help to offset losses from the books that don't make money.

- Victoria
 

kropedykrop

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Morgan James, Robyn Spizman, Rick Frishman

At this month’s meeting of the Atlanta Writers Club, one of the invited speakers, Robyn Freedman Spizman, spoke about her experiences in writing. The talk quickly went from a self-promoting history of travails in publishing, to moralizing about entrepreneurial moxie and indomitable persistence. That took a good fifteen minutes. The remaining period, which may have been seventy-five minutes, but felt more like purgatory, was spent on promoting the non-traditional publisher (you guessed it) Morgan James. Marketing the business strategy as that of a “Collaborative Publisher,” Ms. Spizman vigorously endorsed this alternative to almost certain failure in today’s publishing world.

Citing her fifty published books, one of them a best-seller, (whatever that may mean) Ms. Spizman cut a formidable and persuasive impression of modern snake oil swindling and carpetbaggery. Together with her publicist/collaborator who works closely with Morgan James, a Rick Frishman, the tag-team Morgan James duo spoke to an audience of aspiring writers, many of whom were self-admitted novices (we know because Ms. Spizman took a poll of hands about this). The clincher for me however, came when Ms. Spitzer (with guiding words from Mr. Frishman) announced that Morgan James has “more at stake” with their clients because they require writers to buy 2,500 copies of their own books, which along with fees, total to over $10,000. Now, we’ve heard this all before. I’ve heard this all before. I can go on about a few wise questions of some unpopular audience members asking just exactly how this press differed from a vanity press, what marketing budget they may have had, and so on, all to unsatisfactory answers. However, that is not the point. I took umbrage at the sad fact that many of the people in the audience were older, probably retirees, for whom $10,000 was no small potatoes. If Ms. Spizman convinces even one of them of the wisdom of Morgan James, she will have done her job and sold the lemon, swindling people out of their retirement.


My question is who is this Ms. Spizman? Has she sold fifty books? Are there some kind of best-sellers in her repertoire? I will even allow for her entrepreneurial spirit—after all Morgan James calls themselves “The Entrepreneurial Publisher”—but is selling poison morally excused by being a salesman? Would defrauding beginners be considered a just part of the Collaborative Publisher business model? Part of the answer to the inquiry into Ms. Spizman is settled on her Morgan James company card—“Robyn Freedman Spizman, Executive Publisher, Women’s Division.”


More questions: If Ms. Spizman and Mr. Frishman are successful, or let’s say even legitimate, why do they work for a vanity press like MJ? How could MJ hire them? What kind of a pyramid scheme is this?


There is some information about MJ. Victoria Strauss has blogged about them
here and there is a thread on Absolute Write here.

What can we do to stop this fraud?
 
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Momento Mori

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kropedykrop:
What can we do to stop this fraud?

One thing you can do is speak to the organisers of the Atlanta Writers Club and point them to the discussion threads here and also the Writer Beware blog posts.

Part of the reason self-publishing/vanity publishers get access to naive would-be-writers is because some writing group organisers don't know the first thing about publishing themselves. Therefore, when someone approaches them offering to talk about their book and their publishing business, they take them up on it as a way of bringing something new to their members.

kropedykrop:
I can go on about a few wise questions of some unpopular audience members asking just exactly how this press differed from a vanity press, what marketing budget they may have had, and so on, all to unsatisfactory answers.

That's good to hear. The more people at the writing group who do know how publishing is supposed to operate and who do ask awkward questions, the more likely people are going to think twice about going with them. Had I been there, I certainly would have asked Ms Spizman what she meant by the term "best-seller" and which bookstores stocked her book on their shelves and whether she felt that it was something of a conflict of interest for her to be promoting the advantages of a company that she in fact worked for.

kropedykrop:
What kind of a pyramid scheme is this?

It's not really a pyramid scheme. These companies make money because people are desperate to publish and don't do their research. It's dependent on finding the naive and the desperate and there are, sadly, plenty of those people out there without having to rely on those people selling the scheme to friends and family.

MM
 

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WARNING: Morgan James Publishing

I am writing this note to help save other people from having the kind of very, very bad experience that I had in attempting to work with Morgan James Publishing.

In December of 2007 I entered into an agreement to have Morgan James Publishing, David Hancock and Rick Frishman assist me in publishing a book I had written on business excellence. The experience working with them was so incredibly poor and disappointing that in July of 2008 – with NO progress having been made on my book at Morgan James – literally nothing – that we requested to be released from our contract and have our $5,000 deposit returned. David Hancock agreed and in a signed letter and in multiple emails indicated that he would refund our money as soon as possible. It is now September of 2009 and we have seen nothing. Nothing but lies, manipulation, avoidance and finally, today, a note from David Hancock stating that we should just “face the facts” that the law is on his side. Wow – and here is what it says on David’s website:

One of David’s core values is having strong and mutually beneficial relationships. “We’ve spent years developing many of the key business relationships that allows us to get our books in bookstores and the widespread Web coverage we’ve been able to achieve. We intend to stay constant in our pursuit of positive relationships with people in all facets of our business, and we see that as a strategic advantage.”

Please keep in mind that this is not sour grapes from some cash-strapped author. After wasting nearly a year on Morgan James and their lies, I was able to find a literary agent who sold my book to Jossey-Bass in 10 days – that is right 10 days. My book, Awesomely Simple, is currently available in bookstores nationwide, on Amazon.com, BarnesandNobel.com, 1-800-CEO Read, Audible.com a Kindle version… they have delivered everything that Morgan James Publishing and David Hancock promised – and more – AND I got paid by them!

But do not take my word for it. Below are just a few of the more than 200 emails we have exchanged with Morgan James and David Hancock in the last 18 months. You can see for yourself exactly how David has handled this situation. If you have ANY affiliation with Morgan James Publishing I strongly urge you to read all of these notes – then you can make up your own mind. (they are in typical “reverse order” of forwarded emails – but you should be able to follow the thread without difficulty)

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On Sep 18, 2009, at 11:31 AM, Sheila Spence wrote:

David-
I have a letter signed by you agreeing to refund our deposit in full. The reason we requested the refund was because of the complete lack of performance on the part of Morgan James. Not one of the objectives outlined in the contract / service agreement were executed in the eight months we gave you before terminating the relationship. Due to the fact that you did not do any of work promised and agreed to a full refund - we have absolute grounds to receive our money back.

You have had over 14 months to scrape up the funds to honor your commitment and have been avoiding my calls and ignoring my emails so unless we I receive a full refund by 9/25, I will file suit in NYC small claims court.

Sheila Spence
Flycaster and Company
John Spence LLC


Begin forwarded message:

From: David Hancock <[email protected]>
Date: September 18, 2009 8:57:56 AM EDT
To: Sheila Spence <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Updated Invitation: Phone Consultation w/ David Hancock @ Wed Sep 23 9am – 9:30am (Shelia Spence)

Sheila,

Although I appreciate the opportunity to meet you in person, no one manning the New York office at this time. We've had to cut back significantly this year.

I do have to remind you that although it has been our intention to refund your money, we've not been in a financial position to do so. Also our attorney has recommend that we do not. You have a signed agreement that states the monies paid are non-refundable. The release I signed granting you the rights back does not agree to any refund. The proposed Settlement you signed indicated our hopes to refund, but since we've not had the money to do so, we've not signed it.

So we either ask your patience or face the fact that the law is on our side.

David Hancock, Founder
Morgan James Publishing
The Entrepreneurial Publisher
1225 Franklin Ave Ste 325
Garden City, NY 11530

516-522-0514 Voice
516-908-4496 Fax

www.MorganJamesPublishing.com
www.FaceBook.com/MorganJames
www.Twitter.com/DavidHancock


On Jul 14, 2008, at 3:03 PM, Sheila Spence <[email protected]> wrote:
Dear David-
I would like to arrange a call with you to discuss our publication project. I sent Margo a message last week inquiring on the status of the project and received a very disappointing report. (The message exchange is below for you to read.) Your team has done absolutely nothing since we entered our agreement with you on January 29th, 2008. I have discussed the situation with John and our partner, Tony DiFranco and we have seen enough "red flags" to determine that our project is not a priority to Morgan James. If we cannot get an almost "print ready" book off the ground, we feel it is extremely unlikely that we will see any real effort when the difficult work of marketing John and the book is to begin. John sent me a very strong letter (which I have attached) expressing his thoughts and has instructed me to terminate our relationship and pursue a full refund. This should not be a problem since you have only invested two phone calls with us and it was obvious that there was no preparation done prior to our EVM call.
I know I am being blunt, but I feel there is no use in skirting around the subject. I look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,

Sheila Spence


Begin forwarded message:

From: Sheila Spence <[email protected]>
Date: July 14, 2008 2:30:40 PM EDT
To: Margo Toulouse <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: JSpence -Excelllence by Design

Hi Margo -
We told everyone on the 4/30 EVM call that we wanted to move ahead with your editors and I was not requested to duplicate the request in writing. You quoted a price of 354.90 for the job and we agreed to that price. The call was recorded, so I am sure verification of this request will not be a problem. I am very disappointed that Morgan James let two months pass with no follow-up even if you thought we were working on something. Am I expecting too much? We decided to put our trust in Morgan James because you billed yourselves as an experienced guide to help us through the process - not wait for us to lead the way.

I have discussed this matter with John and our partner Tony DiFranco and they are both as disappointed as I am to hear of the lack of progress on our project.


On Jul 9, 2008, at 2:13 PM, Margo Toulouse wrote:

Hi Sheila, I'm sorry but we've been waiting for your email to confirm
if you wanted to move ahead with the light edit from Pub Serv. You
asked for an estimate because you said that would decide how you
wanted to proceed with the next step. When I never received that
email, we assumed that you were going to use your own editing service.
Please let me know what you would like to do and we'll start the
process. Thank you.. Margo

On Wed, Jul 9, 2008 at 11:43 AM, Sheila Spence
<[email protected]> wrote:

Hi Margo-
I am writing because I am a bit confused. We have not received
any correspondence or contact (except for David's marketing emails) from
your office regarding the progress of the edits on John's book since our EVM
phone call on April 30th. We asked that you move ahead with your editors to
give the book a "light edit" at that time. Are you waiting on us for
something? I know we are supposed to supply the "bonus matter" material but
we understood that this was to be submitted with our review of the Pub
Service edits.
Please advise - thank you!


From: David L Hancock <[email protected]>
Date: July 14, 2008 5:23:09 PM EDT
To: John Spence <[email protected]>


We can talk on the phone about all of this.

Certainly not a case of your project not being a priority to us. Just a case of miscommunication about your wishes on the edit job itself.

I'll have the office void that invoice.

I look forward to talking with you as soon as we can coordinate a time.

David Hancock, Founder
Morgan James Publishing
The Entrepreneurial Publisher
1225 Franklin Ave Ste 325
Garden City, NY 11530

516-620-2528 ext 110 Office
516-908-4496 Fax
800-485-4943 Toll Free

[email protected]
www.MorganJamesPublishing.com



On Jul 14, 2008, at 5:00 PM, John Spence wrote:

It is amazing that we can get an invoice in 15 minutes -- but no work or results for six months -- this is absolutely ludicrous!

This has got to be one of the most ironic and offensive things I have seen in quite a while. What an amazing story of pathetic customer service - I was expecting a refund - not an invoice - incredible!!

I am now even more resolved in my desire to distance ourselves from this firm - let's get this shut down ASAP - John


From:Morgan James Publishing, LLC
To:[email protected]
Cc:[email protected]
Sent:Monday, July 14, 2008 4:47 PM
Subject:Invoice from Morgan James Publishing, LLC

Dear John Spence :

Your invoice is attached for edits.

Thank you for your business - we appreciate it very much.

Sincerely,

Morgan James Publishing, LLC
(516) 620-2528

--------------------------------------------------------------------------


I have been doing business all over the world from more than 20 years and I have NEVER written a note like this before – because I have never had the misfortune of dealing with someone like David Hancock and his team at Morgan James before. I trusted them. I asked for their help. David and Rick assured me they would take “excellent” care of me and my book – and they did NONE of that. When we first told them we were unhappy and that we wanted our money back – they agreed immediately. It was hard from them to put up much of a fight since we had been under contract for SEVEN months and they had made absolutely NO progress on the book. But now, they have decided to hide behind a contract where they did not deliver even a tiny fraction of what they promised to do for me – yet want to keep all of the money. That just does not seem fair or ethical to me.

So I hope you will send this note on to anyone and everyone you know who might be an author or in the publishing industry. Because despite treating their authors the way they have treated me – Morgan James Publishing, David Hancock and Rick Frishman are still out there taking people’s money every day – and I do not want anyone else to have to go through what they have put us through.

Thank you so much – John Spence
 

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I'm sorry this happened to you. And it's nice of you to come on here and let us all know about these scammers. :(

This is yet another example of why authors need to RESEARCH the market before submitting. Authors should not pay a single penny to get their book published (unless they're self-pubbing, but that's a different matter).
 

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I'm also sad to read this thread and your post. I am continuely shocked at the things that go on with people like this. It's appalling. I hope you're going to sue them as you threatened. They're probably counting on you doing nothing because they threw out that "the law is on their side" crap and mentioning "their lawyer". Do they expect you to just take their word for it and quietly slink away?

I hope you don't.
 

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Strikes me that Morgan James are simply pitching themselves somewhere in between Publish America ($1 advance) and Tate ($5000 upfront). Ultimately, vanity, based on the old adage of 'bait and switch'.
 

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AVOID MORGAN JAMES!!!!

I am another person who was duped by Morgan James. Working with them has been the most professionally abysmal experience I have ever had. They have no idea how to design, market or sell a book. It has been nothing but very expensive problems and headaches, and we are now looking to get out of the contract. Working with them has been nothing but sorrows and headaches.
 

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To get back to the issue about 70% of books losing money for a moment: I suspect it's a misunderstanding. If I remember it correctly, about 70% of books fail to earn out--but that's about royalties to the author and has nothing to do with profits for the publisher, which cuts in far sooner. But to people who don't understand the term, "earning out" could be mistaken for profit.

(I hope that makes sense--I've rewritten it several times and seem to get more convoluted each time. Let me know if it's not clear and I'll have another bash at it.)
 

wanda45451964

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Wow !!! 10,000 that you have to put out? worse than Pa.
 

Eirin

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Publishing is changing. The existing model is broken.

Oh man! I wish I had a dollar for every time I've heard the vanity/self-pubbing rallying cry. I could always use a big pile of money.

Publishing is always changing, but it isn't broken. Know how I can tell?

I know that because I, as a reader, can walk into a bookstore or go online to buy all the books I could possibly want; for whichever mood I happen to be in, or on every subject known to man.

You do know that publishing is all about the reader, don't you?
 

James D. Macdonald

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Wow !!! 10,000 that you have to put out? worse than Pa.

No, just about exactly the same as PA.

PA's big innovation was that they grafted payment on the installment plan onto the back end, opening up vanity publication to folks living in trailer courts. No longer would the publication of unreadable and unsalable books be limited to the independently wealthy!
 

WriterMomto3

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Thanks again!

I am an independent editor and my authors are constantly asking me about this publisher or that publisher. I always come here to do the research and you guys have saved me again. Thanks so much! Geez, how many of these scammers are out there??