Family History Book Costs - Gary Wilbanks
Subject: Family History Book Costs
From: Gary Wilbanks
Date: May 08, 2000

Message text written by INTERNET:[email protected]
>  You mentioning a "book on your family" brings to mind another question.
>What is up with all the books being written?  Are people doing this for
>money?  Silly girl......of course.....oh great, now genealogy has me
>answering my own questions.
>  Some one wrote a book about my line and wanted my information about my
>grandmother to put in their book because they didn't have it and then
wanted me to buy the book, huh?.......okkkkk.<

Another person gave me a book on another part of my family and it was huge
>and I was grateful BUT I would only use it as a source.  If I saw
something
>I thought might fit I would go looking for documentation.....

***************************************

The cost of professional printing is very high especially in the very
limited numbers requested by authors of a family history book. These books
are usually printed in numbers of a couple hundred to a couple of thousand
at most, unlike the major publishers of popular books that print in the
hundreds of thousands and are able to reduce costs through the total volume
of books printed.

I hope to have a book on my Wilbanks/Mayfield family of South Carolina
published in the next few years. A family member in the publishing business
gave me an estimated price taking into consideration a family discount. The
estimated discounted price about six years ago was around $5000 for a
limited run of 500 copies. The cost could be higher with photographs and
even higher with color. The costs have increased substantially since then,
possibly even doubled. To break even on publishing costs six years ago
would mean charging $10 per book. This does not cover research costs,
travel costs, long distance calls, mailing costs, photograph duplication
costs, etc. I have already spent over $3000 duplicating pictures that were
lent to me by relatives. I have also spent over $5000 in plane fares, hotel
room expenses, rental car expenses and auto expenses. The author of a
family history book is not going to make money on the book. They are doing
it because they want to share and preserve the family history.

If you want to make money on a book, you will have better luck with a
novel!

I will be indebted to literally hundreds of people that shared information
with me on their families when I publish my book. If I gave everyone a copy
of the book for free that shared information with me, I wouldn't have but a
handful of people left to sell it to. 

Would it be better for me to borrow the $5000 or more to publish the book
and then just give the book away to everyone that shared information?  How
should I try to recoup the $5000 or more in publishing costs and the many
thousands in research costs? Personally, I have chosen to eat the
research/travel/labor costs. That will be my cost for partaking in what I
consider an enjoyable hobby.

Luckily, family members (even those that shared info) at my
Wilbanks/Mayfield Family Reunion realize this and are impatiently waiting
for the chance to purchase a copy when it becomes available. My plan is to
try to keep the price of the book as close as possible to the actual
publishing cost to keep the book affordable. Many of my relatives are
low-income and will not be able to afford a book of $40 or more a copy. I'd
like to keep it around $15-$20 a copy so that everyone in the family can
afford the book.

There is a lot more to publishing a book than most people realize. I have
yet to meet anyone that recouped all of the expenses involved in publishing
a family history book. Most people actually lose money, as I will.

You may want to take some time to think about what the author had to
contribute in time, money and effort to preserve your family's history and
make that book a reality. 

Gary

PS
I do agree with you about documentation. Most family history books are not
to be used as the final source. They are used to find clues, open doors to
research opportunities, etc. The exception is the book that  publishes the
actual source documents and where they were found. Even then, you should
examine the original documents yourself.



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