Trivia
Opening Quote
For the last quote of the last chapter in the book, I selected a classic: It's a Wonderful Life (1946). No man is a failure who has friends.
Buy It's a Wonderful Life on Amazon .com / .co.uk / .fr / .de (these links generate a commission)
Cost of Writing a Book
Many people wonder how much it costs to write and self-publish a book. Obviously, that may vary from book to book. It also depends on your own skills: what do you outsource; what do you do yourself? In any case, this is what I spent (taxes included where applicable):
| Phase | Work | Detail | Original price | Price in Euro |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Development phase | Developmental Editor | I didn't hire one, but I consider hiring one the next time I write a book. | ||
| Writing | I did all the writing myself. | |||
| Reviewing | All my reviewers read the book on a voluntary basis while I was writing it. | |||
| Finding a literary agent / publisher | I tried doing this on my own, but I failed; no one was interested in publishing my book. It's their loss. | |||
| Production Phase | Copy Editor | $1,150.00 | €958.00 | |
| Legal review | €3.201,66 | |||
| Photographer | Photo shoot | €150.00 | ||
| Post-processing | €50.00 | |||
| Production | Title, subtitle, blurb, quotes review | £50.00 | €55.00 | |
| Cover design | £50.00 | €55.00 | ||
| Typesetting print and eBook | £800.00 | €927.00 | ||
| Proofreading | £850.00 | €985.00 | ||
| Marketing | Website | I created my own website | ||
| Social Media | I'm doing my own social media campaign | |||
| E-mail campaign | I did my own email-campaign | |||
| Printing | Proofread copies | hardcover (2 copies + shipping) | €60.44 | |
| paperback (1 copy + shipping) | €12.97 | |||
| Submitting for publication | I submitted the book on the Global Retail Network, Amazon KDP, Kobo, and Draft2Digital myself | |||
| Author copies | Hardcover (50 copies + shipping + import taxes) | €599.76 | ||
| Paperback (50 copies + shipping) | €305.55 | |||
| Distribution | Package material (50 boxes) | €20.99 | ||
| Stamps (enough for sending 16 books in Belgium) | €198.00 | |||
That's an investment of about 7,500 euro (about $9,000), of which the biggest cost was the legal review—I'm sure not everyone will need such a review, but given the topics I discuss I wanted a lawyer to vet the text. To break even, I have to sell about 1,500 and 2,000 copies. The revenue per copy depends on different factors: the version (eBook, paperback, hardcover), the channel (Global Retail, Amazon, Kobo, Draft2Digital), and the region (for instance, Amazon grants a 70% royalty on eBooks in some regions, but only 35% in other regions). I don't have any sales results yet, but I'll publish them on my personal blog after the book has been out for a month or so.
Publishing a book isn't always that expensive. I self-published another book in Dutch, Gebeten, doing all the work myself:
| Phase | Work | Detail | Price in Euro |
|---|---|---|---|
| Development phase | Development & writing | I developed and wrote the book on my own. | |
| Reviewing | All my reviewers read the book on a voluntary basis while I was writing it. | ||
| Production Phase | Legal review | This was done pro bono by the lawyer we engaged to sue a shareholder | |
| Photographer | I used photos from my private collection | ||
| Production | I created the PDF myself using Word and the eBook using Calibre | ||
| Marketing | Website | I didn't create a website for the book | |
| Social Media / email campaign | I didn't do much effort to promote the book | ||
| Printing | Proofread copy | 1 copy | €33.00 |
| 50 copies | April 2020 | €518.14 | |
| 50 copies | May 2020 | €518.14 | |
| 50 copies | May 2020 | €518.14 | |
| 50 copies | June 2020 | €519.84 | |
| 10 copies | May 2021 | €176.96 | |
| Distribution | As the book was in Dutch, and my audience was limited to Belgium (Flanders) and The Netherlands, I decided to handle the distribution myself. I took all the orders, prepared the packages, and brought them to the postal office. | ||
| Package material | €61.17 | ||
| Stamps / shipping | €847.69 | ||
That's about €3,200 euro ($3,840) for 210 books. I sold books for a net amount of about €4,200 euro ($5,050). In other words: I made a profit of €1,000 euro ($1,200) with Gebeten.
Book Quotes
- After reading the Dutch version of this book, many readers asked me, “If you could do everything over, are there things that you would do differently?” I don’t have to think twice about an answer. Of course, I would!
- Then again, the journey might have been less exciting. Without the obstacles and setbacks Ingeborg and I had to overcome, our success might not have been as satisfying.
- We have made mistakes and bad things happened to us. We did some things right and good things happened to us. There wasn’t always a clear cause and effect relationship between doing well and being rewarded, nor between the errors we made and the less pleasant episodes in our lives. We did the best we could, and when we look back, the balance is positive. We have no regrets.
Soundtrack for this Chapter
I listen to music, but my taste in music is questionable. I've selected a handful of songs for every chapters. Sometimes, there's a link to the chapter, sometimes I just like the song.
- At Last, Etta James
- With A Little Help From My Friends, Joe Cocker
- Min Moaten, Flip Kowlier
- Wish I Didn't Miss You, Angie Stone
- It had to be you (Frank Sinatra) / Auld Lang Syne (movie: When Harry Met Sally)