Preferred printing method
Hey guys, I'm back with another one of my polls. Today, I'm interested in hearing your opinion regarding print on demand versus offset printing. To those of you who aren't sure about the differences, here's a breakdown:
Print-on-Demand (POD) Books
POD books are printed as orders come in, typically one at a time or in small batches.
Pros
No upfront costs, no storage needs – There's need to print large quantities in advance, and there's no warehouse or inventory management. This is irrelevant to you guys, but I want you to know all the facts.
Easy distribution – Since I use Amazon and DriveThruRPG for my PoD needs, they have a world-wide reach, which makes it incredibly easy for customers to find and purchase my books.
Cons
Higher per-unit cost – Each book costs more to print compared to bulk printing, which means you guys generally pay more. As an example, look at Across a Thousand Dead Worlds: it costs over 70 USD to print, which means I sell it for about $90. That's $20 of profit per copy, to be split with DTRPG (they keep 35%) and Amazon (they keep 40%). On the other hand, the offset copies I sell via my website are 55€, they are incredibly well put together, and they come with physical tokens and battlemats.
Limited customization and quality – There's only so much that can be done with PoDs, and the quality is not great. They don't fall apart easily, but paper isn't great and the printing is lackluster.
Offset Printing Books
Offset printing involves large-scale production using printing plates and ink for mass printing.
Pros
Lower cost per book in bulk – To be honest, this rarely matters much to me because I make super small print runs (except Across a Thousand Dead Worlds, which had a print run of 2,500 books, I rarely print more than 100 books at a time).
Superior print quality – Sharper images, vibrant colors, and better durability. There's just no comparison.
Cons
High upfront costs – Requires significant investment upfront. This is why most people rely on crowdfunding or preorders.
Storage & inventory – Books need physical space, requiring warehousing.
Risk of unsold stock – Large print runs can lead to excess inventory if demand is miscalculated.
Expensive Shipping - This is the big one. Unless you're one of the rare Blackoath customers that lives in Europe (about 80% of you are in the US), shipping is just criminal, and if the tariffs situation keeps escalating (so far I haven't been affected by it, at least nobody has reported having to pay anything for their books in the US and I'm sending books there almost daily), it's going to be unthinkable.
So with all this in mind, what do you prefer? I obviously prefer to have my books printed at a proper printer, with good paper and quality printing, but it's risky, it's a lot of work to ship all the books (which means less time for me writing), and I have very limited storage space. But some of the PoD titles are really getting out of control with costs, too. The moment the book is printed in what they call premium quality (this is for color books, not black & white), the printing costs skyrocket and I honestly don't know who pays 90 bucks for a PoD book.
So, what do you think?
Comments (25)
I do like quality but I have to go pod. Like already mentioned cost and availability. With currency exchange and all, an Amazon book full price cost me about the same or less then a dtrpg at cost book.
Damn, that's rough!
Not sure, what to click here. In the end, you should look at the sales-figures and do what works best on that front. The best for us is that Blackoath continues being successfull and we can enjoy your great games in the future. I own only PoDs from you up to now and I have no problems with their quality. And you shouldn't underestimate the advertising-effect through Amazon. The first thing, I heard about you was that Amazon thought, I might like a game called Sacrifice - only then I started to look at the notorious podcasts about it and learned about Blackoath Entertainment. The only thing, I personally don't like about offset-copies, is when they are too limited and there is some "fomo" going - it's terrible when you've spent your hobby budget on something else and then you see you can order something now or never - or even: when you first hear about it, all copies are already gone.
I'm not planning on stopping with either PoDs or offset prints, I feel they compliment each other. As for what sells better, it really depends on the book, of course. But yes, nothing beats the reach of PoDs sold via Amazon!
Didn’t vote because I like and use both. Premium hardcover for main/core books. POD for smaller supplements or smaller games. I am in US, so shipping is a factor… but not a dealbreaker. I just missed the Kickstarter for Riftbreakers 2E, but I would definitely purchase a nice hardback…and probably a PoD as well for table use and any follow on supplements, cards, etc.
Thanks for your feedback! I personally use both as well. Cheap PoDs are great as table books that you can be less careful with.
I prefer quality over ease, but I will opt for whatever best supports the creators that I purchase books from.
Thank you!
I prefer offset printing. There's also the matter of PoD books eventually falling apart. I haven't had this issue too much with DriveThru but it's always a possibility when the pages are just glued in. Offset books should last a lifetime and are of higher quality all around.
I must say, I haven't had a PoD book fall apart, ever, and I own hundreds of them. The glue they use nowadays for that sort of binding is incredibly strong. But yeah, nothing beats smyth-sewn spines!
Sadly I ordered soft bound copy of Ruthless Heavens from Amazon and the print was VERY light, light gray in color and hard to read against the low quality paper which was a gray sheen also. So I had them send me another and same thing. Appreciated the differentiation in the tables between light and dark and was easy to use in video review I watched, but the tables were non existent in this print run sadly. So don’t know if that was Amazon but thinking twice about ordering book from them again through their print services. In the end however, you have to do what makes sense to your business so it doesn’t harm the work you are doing.
Frenchy here, so I prefer buy offset book : better quality and cheaper.
Haha yeah, makes sense!
As much as I love the quality of offset copies, I usually go for the PODs from Amazon because of the cheaper shipping. The Machine Gods bundle + Ker Nethalas offset I ordered was €33 (~$37.60) in shipping fees, which is crazy considering the books themselves were €90. It's just so much more affordable to get the PODs, unfortunately. I'm in the US if you couldn't tell. LOL
Yes, I figure most will agree with you. PoDs are just so incredibly convenient.
It depends. Usually I want an offset for a larger book with nice art, etc. If it’s a short book that is mostly text and tables, POD is fine.
Yeah, makes total sense! My books have tons of art, though, which is also why I love seeing them printed nicely.
There's no option for slipcovers 😆 ...I do miss the slipcovers though
I'll continue making slipcovers, haha. They're expensive though, a book + slipcover is the same as making 2 books!
I prefer PDFs, the POD are good but not awesome and the postage for the offset printing is a killer for me. Specially if it comes with extras as that makes it pay customs as it's qualified as a game, and we pay custom taxes on the product + shipping, while a book alone doesn't pay at all as books are exempted by saying it's not a game, it's instructions for a game.
Ah, I was sure you're in Italy, because of your name! I ship from Spain, so shipping to Europe is relatively cheap still, and of course, no customs. Also, I ship my games as books, so nobody in the US pays for them as games, despite having tokens and maps. Those aren't really visible unless you open the package, and remove the book's shrink-wrap.
something to consider for off set printing, is to do it as a preorder so that you don't have to shoulder the burden, and potential risks of unsold books. You could use the sign up sheet for offset printing to gauge interest. Once you have enough to meet minium print with some padding for potential change of minds, create a preorder.
Yes, I've thought about this, and it's something I've done before (not with Blackoath, I had another publishing business before this). The problem is that people are EXTREMELY unreliable when it comes to pre-orders, if you don't charge upfront. Most people will say "sure, I'll want a copy!" and then when the moment comes to pay for it, time has passed, they might have lost interest, or some expense has come up, and they back off. So if I do pre-orders, it must be charging upfront, as I've been doing up until now. But yes, pre-orders are the way to go, that or Kickstarter.
Is it either / or? Can't you do a initial print run and once that is gone offer pod? Wouldn't it also be possible to partner with a "publisher" in the US who prints and ships from there? I got a few POD books and while it's fine for small, thin books, I wouldn't pay more than 30€ or so for that quality tbh.
it's definitely not an either/or situation, I just want raw data to see where people stand. Since making offset copies supposes more work and risk, I want to know if people are willing to pay for the increased quality, despite the abysmal shipping. As I said, I'm a very vane person and I want to see all my books printed nicely, haha. So I'll do offset whenever I get the chance. As for partnering with someone in the US to print the books there, it's insanely expensive to print anything there (which is why almost nobody in the RPG scene does), I've looked into it and I can't afford it at the moment.