An Incomplete Explanation of the 5 Key Pieces to the Book Publishing Industry Puzzle
The journey for ideas to become readable material is painstaking. Today, I’m covering the basics for what the Read. portion of the blog means: publishing.
What kind of publishing? For the most part, I’ll cover book publishing, which has an absurd amount of nuances and niches within it. From the Big 5 publishing houses to self-publishing to what your rights are as an author and a whole bunch of stuff in between.
There are hundreds of roles that bring a book to life, but today we’re going to start with the basics about the process of how a book gets from the writer’s hands to the reader’s hands.
Who are the major players in the publishing industry?
Literary Agencies
Publishers
Distributors
Wholesalers
Retailers
Before we begin, I first have to lay down some vocabulary. The publishing industry is filled with somewhat confusing jargon. For example:
You are a writer until you are published, then you are an author
Subsequently, your writing is called a manuscript until it’s in the process of being professionally edited, then it’s called a galley, finally, when it is published, it’s officially a book
A query letter is an email pitch to a literary agent, who may or may not also be an editor
A publisher is also called a publishing house
A proposal is sent to an editor within a publishing house and may include a 10-page summary of the manuscript, a biography of the writer’s credentials and sometimes even a marketing plan
A distributor may be a wholesaler but a wholesaler is not a distributor because they function differently
Are you confused yet? It’s daunting, I know, so let’s explore what this all means and how it all fits together.
Literary Agency
This is a team of professionals who have dedicated their time to scout and refine talent. The writer crafts an email pitch called a query, and send it to a literary agent who works within their genre of books. If all goes well, then the literary agent may request the full manuscript to read over. If they love it and believe there is a market for it, then they draw up a contract with the writer.
From there, the literary agent may act as the writer’s editor, or the writer may be assigned a writer within the literary agent. Together, the duo or trio work to revise and prepare the manuscript to be sent out to publishers.
I should note here that reputable literary agencies do not charge for submissions, editing or contracting with them. Literary agencies make money off commission from their client’s books, usually 10-15% of either the sale price (sticker price of the book) or net sale (the discount price of the book) or profit (after all costs have been covered). Until the book becomes published, the literary agent doesn’t make any money.
Publisher
Publishers come in many sizes and forms from digital-first boutiques to the big five conglomerates. A proposal is sent to one of the many editors within a publisher. If the editor loves it and they believe the publisher can reach the target audience it caters to, then the editor will take it up the chain of command to see if a contract can be drawn up.
The publisher will take a percent of the sale or profits, which will vary widely depending on the size and type of publisher.
Distributor
Distributors are the outsourced sales team that fulfill orders to wholesalers and sometimes straight to retailers, which would also make them a wholesaler. Distributors may work exclusively with a particular genre or publishing house to handle the logistics of getting a book onto the digital and physical store shelves. Their services come with a price tag, but it’s arguably the price of scale.
Wholesaler
Wholesalers fulfill bulk orders from retailers by partnering with distributors. Because they handle bulk orders, they don’t work exclusively with particular genres or publishing houses usually. Wholesalers are the second middle-man and for larger publishing houses who serve authors whose works are for a larger target audience, these wholesalers are an essential part of the logistics. For smaller publishers and authors, who serve smaller target audiences, distributors can fulfill the role of wholesalers.
Retailers
This is the final destination for books. From the publisher to the distributor to the wholesaler, the book finally reaches the shelf, whether digital or physical for the reader to buy. The price the readers see is reflective of all the people in the process who take a cut, leaving the author with a small portion of the sticker price per copy.
Taking a step back, we can see that this is a long process. For many authors, it takes years to find a literary agent and many more months to find the right publisher and even more months to get it ready for distribution.
In future posts, we’ll discuss the digital disruption happening within the publishing industry across the last 10-15 years and the catalysts for change that will affect the next several decades of publishing.
Until next time,
Rochele