Subsidy and Vanity Publishers - What Are They and Who Are They?

The definition is short and sweet:

Wikipedia - “A vanity press, vanity publisher, or subsidy publisher is a term describing a publishing house in which authors pay to have their books published.”

The Free Dictionary - “A publisher that publishes a book at the expense of the author.”

Authors who self-publish also pay to publish their own books. But if they use a subsidy press, they are not truly self-published because another factor besides money comes into play - ownership of the ISBN:

Street Directory - “When you publish via a Subsidy Press, they are technically the Publisher of Record because they own the ISBN number. They cannot (and will not) sell you the number, give you the number, or assign ownership of the number to you. As long as they own the ISBN, they are the publisher. You did not self-publish. You paid someone to publish you. The only way for you to own the ISBN is for you to buy it from the only ISBN broker in the US; Bowkers.”

If an author has not purchased the ISBN from Bowker, then they are not self-published.

Ultimately, a subsidy publisher is simply a servicing company. They make money by selling services to writers and authors. And like any business, they are in it to make money. So, for these services, they charge a much higher price so they can make a profit. (For example, if you register your work with the Copyright Office, it’s $35.00 and the cost of mailing two books. Some subsidy presses charge as high as $170.00 to do the same thing.)

The easiest way to remember the difference between the three types of publishing is through this formula:

Traditional -
Publisher pays all expenses to produce and distribute book
Publisher owns the ISBN
Publisher makes money by selling books to the public

Self -
Author pays all expenses to produce and distribute book
Author owns the ISBN
Author makes money by selling books to the public

Subsidy -
Author pays all expenses to produce and distribute book
Publisher owns the ISBN
Publisher makes money by selling services to the author

Now, who are these subsidy presses? Below is a short list of the hundreds out there.

Note that these three can also be considered subsidy presses - CreateSpace, Lulu, and Smashwords. (And there are several others.) Again, it all comes down to who owns the ISBN. If the author buys his or her ISBN from Bowker and uses those companies to print & distribute, it’s considered self-publishing. If the author uses an ISBN provided by those companies, then he or she is subsidy published.

List of Subsidy Publishers

Vantage Press
Author Solutions (AuthorHouse, iUniverse, Xlibris and Trafford)
Dorrance Publishing
Outskirts Press
Morris Publishing
America Star Books (formerly PublishAmerica)
Xulon Press
SBPRA/Strategic Book Publishing/Eloquent Books (formerly known as The Literary Agency Group and AEG Publishing Group)
Janus Press
Bookstand Publishing
Tate Publishing
Mill City Press
Whitmore Publishing Company

What other vanity presses have you encountered? Have you experience with one of these comapnies?

Search Word Pro - Pure Genius Resource for Writers and More!

One of the advantages of networking with others in the industry is to hear about new innovations long before they’re available.

I’ve known and worked with Paul J. Krupin for many years. He owns Direct Contact PR and is one of the top media experts in the business. A while back, he’d bounced an idea off me and sent me a sample of a revolutionary new marketing resource.

I was blown away. It was simple but pure genius.

And now, the series is available for everyone with more titles on the way.

From Paul’s own book, this is how it works:

Click on an icon link. Your results open up for you. Then you go looking for knowledge and ideas you can implement and benefit from, or people you want to contact. This is how this ebook works.

The goal of Search Word Pro is to help you improve your marketing success using the best and most current knowledge available. This is a very special personal tool designed to help you discover powerful and actionable information.

And that is the genius. Each search nets the most recent information. And you don’t have to struggle trying to find the right key words. Not only are there five search options for each topic, there are hundreds, even thousands, of key words and topics in each book. All just one click away. Now you see the potential!

Paul provides details and tips how to use the book to get the most potential. The benefits and possibilities are endless. And it’s not just books to benefit writers - there are health and business-specific titles, too.

Visit the Search Word Pro Website or this page on Amazon to see all of the titles.

I’m still going through the Nonfiction Book Marketing eBook and can’t recommend it enough. Go check out his books now!

Here’s just a sample of the titles for writers and authors:

Search Word Pro Book Marketing Series

Book Marketing

Nonfiction Book Marketing

Fiction Book Marketing

Children’s Book Marketing

Young Adult (YA) Book Marketing

Romance Book Marketing

Erotica Book Marketing

LGBT Book Marketing

Cookbooks Book Marketing

Memoir Book Marketing

Christian Book Marketing

Science Fiction Book Marketing

EBook Marketing

Kindle EBook Marketing

Bookstore Marketing

See a book that might help you?

The Insecure Writer's Support Group

It’s time for another edition of The Insecure Writer’s Support Group, hosted by Ninja Captain, Alex J. Cavanaugh. Don’t forget to check out the Facebook IWSG, too.

After completing some big projects, including moving and setting up a new website, I’m ready to get back into writing. I pulled out some outlines for some novella length stories and picked one. I already have character sheets for all four of the stories, so now all they need is for me to actually write them. My last fiction book was four years ago, so wish me luck as I dive back into storytelling.

And I want to share something that was posted last week on a List-Serv -

“Amazon is facing a battle with UK publishers as it seeks to secure more advantageous terms in its latest round of contract negotiations.

“The web giant wants the right to print books itself if publishers fail to provide adequate stock, and wants publishers to match any pricing deals it offers to other distributers.”

This was one of the responses:

“If publishers give in to this demand, presumably Amazon will require a copy of the finished publishing file to keep handy. Once Amazon has that, what is to keep Amazon from printing its own copies in-house even when the real publisher has adequate stock?”

Kind of scary when you think about it.

Tryon Palace and Gardens

Since Wednesday is the Insecure Writer’s Support Group, I decided to post something light and fun today.

Recently, Sherry Ellis of Gone Gardening posted about Tryon Palace and Gardens in New Bern. I’ve been there several times, both with family and our local photo club, and taken A LOT of photos. It’s a beautiful place and I’d like to share some images:

This image is one of the stock images for sale at my Spunk On A Stick site. (And thanks to everyone who checked out my new site last week. Transferring my domain name this week and then everything will be set!)

Inspired by any images lately?