For Authors published by Traditional companies

If you're with a commercial publisher, the bookstore can and should order copies in advance. In my case, my publicist at DAW often follows up a few weeks beforehand to make sure the store has copies.

It never hurts to lug along a few extras, just in case. I've had one booksigning where the store underordered and sold out all of their copies before I even arrived. Naturally, that was the one event where I didn't bother to bring extra copies.

My first, and so far only, book pubbed was by a small publisher. The bookstore ordered the books, and the publisher supplied the books for book signings. I just showed up with pen in hand.

stormie said:

My first, and so far only, book pubbed was by a small publisher. The bookstore ordered the books, and the publisher supplied the books for book signings. I just showed up with pen in hand.

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I hear that if you make the bestseller lists, the bookstores will even provide the pen

jchines said:

I hear that if you make the bestseller lists, the bookstores will even provide the pen

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A gold Cross pen would be nice. Or maybe even a pen and pencil set.

Stuffedtoy said:

I have recently typed myself into a forum discussion, and I'd like to know... Who supplies the books for book signings? The publisher, or must the author pay for the books in advance?

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FYI, the phrase "traditional publisher" was invented by the vanity publisher PublishAmerica to describe itself. Do not use it (or the variant "traditional companies") to refer to real publishers.

If you mean legitimate commercial publishers (Random House, to name a big one, or, say, Heydey, to name a small press), bookstores order copies in the normal course of business (from publisher or via distributor).

But if you were referring to vanity and subsidy publishers, then the author is usually stuck with supplying the books on consignment.

--Ken

ResearchGuy said:

FYI, the phrase "traditional publisher" was invented by the vanity publisher PublishAmerica to describe itself. Do not use it (or the variant "traditional companies") to refer to real publishers.

If you mean legitimate commercial publishers (Random House, to name a big one, or, say, Heydey, to name a small press), bookstores order copies in the normal course of business (from publisher or via distributor).

But if you were referring to vanity and subsidy publishers, then the author is usually stuck with supplying the books on consignment.

--Ken

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Hi Ken;
I will politely disagree with you as to the term traditional. I work as a series editor for a publishing house in the U.K., although I am here in America among the many self published. I remember PublishAmerica coming onto the scene.
I/we have used the term traditional publisher to distinguish from the self published or vanity presses for years. I never have any misunderstanding about this term. Whether I am talking to an experienced writer individually or to many at every organization or writers group association where I attend meetings or am a member. The term traditional does reflect the long standing process that houses are known for.
I also found that when I used the term "vanity press" self published authors took offense. As a literary translator I work with the self published and the traditional houses. The differences are clear in both process and outcome.

The books sold at the book signings I did for my translation of a children's book were provided by the self published author-then paid for at the register of the bookstore. The author got a percentage of the books sold.

When my traditional publisher and I are doing book signings, we sell the books to the bookstore or venue first and that amount is used for signings. The author gets the royalty for the books sold.

talkwrite said:

Hi Ken;
I will politely disagree with you as to the term traditional. . . . .

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Suit yourself, but it is still a problematic term. If you want to go back a while, the "tradition" involved booksellers printing books themselves (sometimes ones they had written or assembled). In the era of international conglomerate publishers, it is not clear what the "tradition" is. And for that matter, vanity publishing goes back generations and has published many thousands of books, long enough and busy enough to be called "traditional."

Self-publishing is not the same as vanity publishing. Self-publishers do not delude themselves that their work has been accepted and published through a selective process by commercial publishers. (I mean real self-publishers, who establish a business, buy a block of ISBNs, and manage the entire process of publishing, whether doing the work themselves or contracting for services. Of COURSE those people would be offended to be labeled vanity publishers, a pejorative term.)

I know it gets complicated. But the fact is that the notorious vanity publisher PublishAmerica touts itself as "a traditional publisher" while accepting practically everything submitted to it (until the day's quota has been reached) and focusing its entire business model on selling in bulk to the authors. The impact that misleading phrase has on naive writers is why I make an effort to debunk the phrase. (PA of course twists everything else about publishing in its promotions -- which are aimed entirely at authors, not at the trade or the book-buying public.)

FWIW.

Thanks for your comments.

--Ken

Stuffedtoy said:

I have recently typed myself into a forum discussion, and I'd like to know... Who supplies the books for book signings? The publisher, or must the author pay for the books in advance?

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In my case: the book stores always ordered them, or in the case of convention or festival they got them straight from the publisher.

Stuffedtoy said:

GhostWriters Literary reviews; is looking for committed reviewers.
This is a new site not yet open to the public- need to get reviewers before I get swamped. If interested let me know.
http://heavenlytrinkets.com/reviews/
Some areas are still under construction.

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Our Announcements, Events, and Self-Promotion forum would be fine for this.

Stuffedtoy said:

committed reviewers.

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I've been released to a halfway house -- is that close enough?

Re: Term

I would like to say I can see where the term "traditional publisher," is problematic. First, there's the group of people who define it solely as the "mega" publishers and authors published by anyone else simply aren't "authors." Then, there's the group who uses it for any print publisher who uses the traditional methods of printing. And yet another group who classifies it as any publisher who simply follows the standard process (i.e. author is accepted after a manuscript evaluation, manuscript heads to the proofreading/editorial department, cover department, etc.).

I'm not sure if I have a concrete definition, but there is a lot of confusion out there over what it means. It's alot like horror which I posted about in the horror forum.

I think it never hurts to bring along copies of your book to a signing. You never know.