When the book sells on the author’s Web site or the Nightengale Press bookstore, the author splits the net 50/50 (retail – print cost) without the 55% cost to Ingram. This exceeds the commercial publisher’s gross receipt percentage royalty by 33%.

If the author has reason to sell books in the back of the room, he gets 70% of net ((retail – print cost + 30% for the publisher) which exceeds the commercial publisher’s royalty by 400%.

Nightengale Press pays royalties on a regular six month schedule, produces well-designed, edited books and helps the author promote his work through the PMA model of cooperative marketing, advertising and PR opportunities.

There is nothing confusing about what we offer the author. Our authors win at all levels and their royalties never falls below the rate of the “classical” commercial publisher. Nightengale Press is in its fourth year, we have thirty-six authors with over fifty published and forthcoming titles among them, in mystery-thriller, sci-fi, romance, military non-fiction, medical non-fiction, fitness, inspirational non-fiction, children’s educational, children’s poetry, juvenile fiction, humorous short story, historical fiction, adventure, and living memoir genres. The roster of authors continues to grow, but we do not take every author that appears on our horizon, and we do work to promote every book to the extent the author will allow and participate in the work of promotion.

Pricing the book is dependent on page count, how hot the topic of the book is and what promotional schedule is planned. Pricing is dependent on covering print costs, wholesaler and distributor percentages and still having a royalty for the author of at least $.50 per book through bookstores and other online stores than the author’s Web site or Nightengale Press’s bookstore. Our trade paperbacks average $15.95. The full color children’s books average $16.95, more expensive, but not outrageously so.

Nightengale Press works hand in hand with stores in the author’s local realm. Some authors need help with this, and Nightengale Press works to get group and individual author signings in bookstores where several authors are clustered within a reasonable driving distance.

Nightengale Press offers trade distribution for selected titles through BookMasters, a recognized and reputable distributor in the bookstore marketplace, and through Lightning Source's offset services. These books will be printed offset in a print run of two thousand books and will still be available online as they currently are with the print on demand print option through LightningSource, Inc.

Nightengale Press books are available for order in bookstores nationwide through Ingram, Baker & Taylor, Bowker’s BooksInPrint and failing all of that, directly from the publisher. We stress the importance of creating demand to our authors, and we help them find the means to do so individually and collectively. We also submit our titles for consideration of the Barnes and Noble Small Press Department. If accepted by B&N, the select titles will appear on B&N store shelves. We currently have titles on the shelves at B&N and look forward to more each month.

Nightengale Press pays standard distributor discounts and accepts bookstore returns. This willingness to play by the traditional rules when necessary sets us apart from msot small publishers. We can get our books into bookstores for author signings, and with our new arrangement with BookWorld, we are opening the tradtional doors to shelving our books in stores as well.

We provide our authors the option to have a full fledged comprehensive and attractive Web site devoted to them as individual authors and to their books. We also have featured titles on the bookstore and rotate these periodically so give all our authors exposure there as well, even those who do not have a Web site. But, let me say, only two of our authors do not have a Web site.

Our response time to emails is typically within two hours. Everyone is very busy, and to sit all day working at email isn’t practical, but setting a portion of time aside for that task, and multi-tasking is a way of life in a good publisher’s world. We take calls and deal personally with our authors. We are truly invested in our authors’ needs and desires, with all efforts made to communicate with them collectively, as individuals and on their behalf with whomever we can.

Nightengale Press consistently produces award-winning books and we have good opportunity to dispell the notions that swirl in the marketplace about a publisher that charges a fee. The reason there is an issue goes back to the dawn of “vainty publishing,” where the publisher took a fee, produced books of sub-standard quality, charged high fees to the author, provided no makrketing, did not pay a royalty, and essentially left the author dangling in the wind. Old stereotypes die hard, and some new twists on the old “vanity press” model make life even harder for small presses who are embracing the new printing technologies. The term “POD publisher” is fraught with confusing and negative connotations. There are many reasons for this confusion.

Print On Demand is a Printing Process. It is not a publishing standard.

The printer makes the book after the customer has paid for the product. It eliminates the need for warehousing. It levels the marketing playing field by eliminating waste and inefficiency. It takes the risky “betting on the horses” elements out of the publishing model, eliminates returns, and has opened the floodgate so far that over 2400,000 books are published every year. Not all of these book are good books. Not all of them are bad books either. And, agents, reviewers, bookstore buyers, distributors, and the giants of commercial publishing cannot compete with items like instant payment to the publisher, nearly instant production and shipment to the customer, and the enormously fluid availability of books from talented, unknown authors.