How can I estimate the cost of book production?

Question

I normally work with publishers, but a client has come to me wanting me to write a book for their company. I know what I'll charge for the writing, but they want me to contract all of the project. What can I expect to pay for:

technical illustrator (illustrations on nearly every page)
art / design for entire book
printing (~5000 copies, 100 pp. each, soft cover, 4-color throughout)

I've spoken to a few printers locally, but get a lot of runaround. I think they want to seal a deal before committing to a price. I just need to provide an estimate, not a quote to the client.

Answer 1

If you have to employ an illustrator, you can figure AT LEAST a $1,000.00 to $5,000.00 charge depending on the number and complexity of the illustrations. Plus, you want everything in full colour. Apparently, you also need a designer for the whole book, who will design the front cover & back cover, and pagination and margins, and perhaps also the font & type-setting. That is probably another $2,500.00 to $4,000.00 or so. Considering all that, you probably want Perfect Binding, rather than just punching holes in the manuscript and sticking it in a file. Of course, if you want the color photos to come out well, you will use glossy paper rather than regular copier paper.

It is good that you need a (relatively) large number of copies. At 20,000 and more, generally, you get the cheapest price per copy. I would say, at a rough guess, that you are looking at about $20.00 per copy, especially if you have to pay for postage to get 5,000 copies delivered. And that $20.00 per copy cost does not even include the cost (in dollars and in labor) in managing such a project properly.

When you get the CD from the illustrator and another CD from the book designer, be sure to BACK IT UP! I would put it on a hard-drive, network drive, flash-drive AND another CD, just to be sure.

You're lucky! I wish I had this job :) I'd make a pretty good profit on it considering the number of hours I would have to work with several different people, managing the project. Good luck! If all goes well, I would like to know how the project turned out, in the end.

Answer 2

Emmee:
If I give you a place here they accuse me of abuse. But the best I have ever worked with is Victoria Bindery in Canada, No set up charges, just per book. No contracts nessesary and you pay Canadian $ so another savings if from USA. I make nothing for this only trying to help. If you need any more info email me at [e-mail]
Wayne Russell The Vagabond Writer.

Answer 3

I've researched something similar to what you have in mind, and the best two sites I've found are lulu,com and instantpublisher.com--they both are self-publishers who will give you a quote immediately after entering a few pieces of data. I typed in your data at instantpublisher.com (with a 8.5x11 sized page), and it came out to be $8.22 per book, or $41,100.00 for 5000 copies. If you did a book with 6x9 dimensions, it would go down to $6.53 a book, or $32, 650.00 for 5000 copies. Good luck with your project!

Answer 4

It basically costs aboutt $2 to produce a soft cover, and about $6 to produce a hard cover. How much you want to spend on advertising and the extras is up to you, depending on where you get it done and how far you take it.