Print on Demand Prices Changing in April

Hello Publishers,

I hope that your February is going fantastic!

This is a quick update for print on demand books as we prepare for the following print cost changes in April. We do not have a definite date yet, but as we get closer, we will notify you as soon as possible.

The short version is that Lightning Source has implemented a pretty significant change to their print cost structure. As a result, there will be a few changes coming to our sites soon:

·       Short books of all types will generally decrease substantially in cost as the fixed price for low page count books goes away.

·       B&W books will be 10-15% cheaper.

·       Standard Color books will be 10-35% more expensive.

·       Premium Color books will be 15-30% cheaper.

    There will no longer be a "Medium" size for Premium Color books. The 6"x9", 6.14"x9.21" sizes will now be considered small, and the 8.5"x8.5" size will now be considered large.

Changes to Book Print Costs

You can compare the new cost formulas below to the current costs here:

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/pub_pod_cost.php

The new cost formulas below apply to all available page counts.

·       Black and White (Small / Softcover): $1.55 + $0.0138 per page

·       Black and White (Small / Hardcover): $5.98 + $0.0138 per page

·       Black and White (Large / Softcover): $1.61 + $0.0202 per page

·       Black and White (Large / Hardcover): $5.98 + $0.0202 per page

·       Standard Heavyweight/70 (Small / Softcover): $1.55 + $0.0316 per page

·       Standard Heavyweight/70 (Small / Hardcover): $5.98 + $0.0316 per page

·       Standard Heavyweight/70 (Large / Softcover): $1.61 + $0.0503  per page

·       Standard Heavyweight/70 (Large/ Hardcover): $5.98 + $0.0503 per page

·       Premium (Small / Softcover): $1.55 + $0.0676 per page

·       Premium (Small / Hardcover): $5.98 + $0.0676 per page

·       Premium (Large / Softcover): $1.61 + $0.0905 per page

·       Premium (Large / Hardcover): $5.98 + $0.0905 per page

·       Premium Color Landscape will have the same price as other Premium Large formats.

·       There will be no more Quantity Discounts for bulk orders over 50 copies.

Updating Site Prices for POD

In April, when we update print costs for your POD books, we will adjust the site price on your titles automatically so as to maintain the margin you have set for that printed format. As part of this site price adjustment, we will try to maintain similar price points that still end with $X.95, $X.99, or $X.00 to stay as close as possible to the prices you have set currently.

For example, if you have a 300-page, hardcover, premium color, 8.5x11” book on site now, the current print cost of that would be $39.90. After the April cost changes, the print cost will drop to $33.13.

If you currently have the print margin on this title set to $20.09, then its site price to customers would be $39.90 + $20.09 = $59.99.

With the April update, our code will first attempt to maintain your margin of $20.09, re-setting the site price initially to $33.13 (new print cost) + $20.09 = $53.22.

As that site price does not match the format of your former site price ($59.99 follows the $X.99 format), then our code will adjust your margin from $20.09 to $20.86, so that your new site price becomes $33.13 + $20.86 = $53.99.

Of course, after the April update, you are free to further adjust your margins (and resulting site prices).

We think this automatic price reset is the easiest and most effective process for us and you. We welcome your feedback.

What if I planned my KickStarter?

Many KickStarters print runs may benefit from the cost reductions, but if you already planned on a larger (i.e., higher page count) standard color book, you may be facing a sizable cost increase.

We will work with you on grandfathered pricing if your KickStarter launches on or before March 1st, 2019. If you are within that date range, please contact your Publisher Service Representative so we can work with you through your fulfillment.

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to reach out to me through e-mail during normal business hours.

Yours,

Meredith Gerber

Tiny Trove: Coming Soon to DriveThruRPG

Ogden, UT – February 28, 2019

Gallant Knight Games and DriveThruRPG are pleased to announce a new community content program, centered on the TinyD6 ruleset: Tiny Trove!

 

The minimalist TinyD6 ruleset has been a hit since it’s launch, and now fans can create their own content centered around Tiny Dungeon 2e! Now, Gallant Knight Games and DriveThruRPG have partnered to let independent content creators publish material utilizing the TinyD6 ruleset and set in the top quality variety micro-settings published in TinyD6 products!

 

Tiny Trove features:

·       Self-publish service for tabletop RPG material set using Tiny Dungeon 2e

·       Creators themselves set the price for the material they publish and receive 50% of the revenue

·       Access to over templates and art packs that will evoke the feel of Tiny Dungeon 2e

·       Additional content supporting other TinyD6 game lines will roll out beginning with Tiny Frontiers: Revised in May, 2019 and continuing forward.

About Gallant Knight Games

Gallant Knight Games is a tabletop gaming company dedicated to high-quality roleplaying games and card and board games. Founded in 2015 by Alan & Erin Bahr, Gallant Knight Games publishes it’s flagship TinyD6 line, featuring Tiny Dungeon 2e, Tiny Wasteland, Tiny Frontiers: Revised, along with other games such as Cold Shadows, For Coin & Blood, Beach Patrol, and many more. www.gallantknightgames.com contact: alan@gallantknightgames.com

About DriveThruRPG

DriveThruRPG.com is part of a family of premiere online marketplaces including RPGNow, DriveThruRPG, DriveThruCards, DMsGuild, DriveThruComics, DriveThruFiction, and Wargame Vault. Together, we have been selling digital and print-on-demand comic books, roleplaying games, and fiction since 2001. As of 2016, we have launched multiple community content programs as well as our Community Card Creator for fans to create content for some of their favorite roleplaying and card games. www.onebookshelf.comContact: meredith@onebookshelf.com

DriveThruRPG Responds to Current Industry News

Thanks to everyone for your patience as we deliberated on the situation that has unfolded regarding Zak Smith (aka Zak Sabbath). At DriveThruRPG, we want to do our part to keep bad actors out of the roleplaying community, and we don’t want business relationships with such people. As such, you’d think there wouldn’t be much deliberation needed on our part. However, the situation posed a number of challenges for us to consider in terms of precedent and collateral impact on other parties.

I have decided that we will not accept future titles for sale on DriveThruRPG (or our other marketplaces) if Zak is a contributor on the title. If any publisher has a title-in-process to which Zak is a contributor and this policy would impact you financially, then we’d ask that you please reach out to us via the publisher services link to have a dialogue about that title.

For titles currently on our marketplace in which Zak is listed as a contributor, we have checked those publisher accounts, and none of these titles have us paying money directly to Zak. While it is likely that Zak does earn a royalty on some titles sold on DriveThruRPG, any such royalties would be paid directly by the publisher of the title, not by DriveThruRPG.

Further, whatever royalty Zak might get from any publisher on our store is unlikely to be the entirety of what we pay that publisher. We do not feel it’s fair to penalize financially those who worked with Zak in the past, including both publishers and possibly other contributors earning income from these titles. Therefore, we expect publishers to make their own decision to continue selling these titles or not, presumably after consulting with all other contributors.

For our part, we will be identifying all titles to which Zak contributed and diverting all of the revenue shares that DriveThruRPG might make from sales of these titles as a donation to RAINN (https://www.rainn.org/).

I’ll try to pre-emptively answer other possible questions below.

When this happened, why did you not suspend sale of Zak’s titles while you deliberated?When we expect that it will take us a few days to deliberate on a title reported for offensive content, our policy is to temporarily suspend sales of that title. In this case, though, it was not the content of any particular title under discussion, and we did not find any titles where we directly paid Zak for ongoing sales during our deliberation.

So DriveThruRPG is now banning certain creators? Will whoever the “outrage brigade” complains about next be banned as well?
We all share a responsibility for the health of our hobby. Any demographic measure we’ve ever seen on the roleplaying hobby shows women are under-represented. Things won’t improve if people shirk the responsibility to make our hobby inclusive.

Zak Smith has a long and well-documented history of behaviors antithetical to a healthy community. In light of recent allegations, which we find credible, we think our business and our hobby is better off without him, so we’re doing our part.

We already have a small list of other bad actors in the industry with whom we refuse to do business: people who have repeatedly abused crowdfunding platforms for personal enrichment, who repeatedly engaged in IP violations, who have repeatedly treated our staff or customers in unacceptably unprofessional ways, and so on. If you repeatedly act like a jerk (or worse, a predator), we won’t wait for other people to complain about you. We’ll just quietly stop doing business with you.

Why are you not banning his existing titles?
Because we don’t want to hurt other people who also contributed to those same titles just to diminish Zak. Banning those existing titles risks doing just that.

Thanks,
Steve Wieck
President
OneBookShelf / DriveThruRPG