the publishing house » rights and royalties


The standard type of Publishing Rights for your book will depend on which imprint your book is published under.

Authors under da diamonds are signed up on a mainstream contract, thus granting discovered authors the exclusive rights to publication.

Under four o'clock press, da horizons and da revivals, authors retain 100% of the publishing rights to their books and grant discovered authors the non-exclusive publishing rights.

So if you are offered the chance to be promoted to a DA Diamond or get snapped up by John Murray for example, just go for it, just ask us to terminate your contract and off you go with our full support and congratulations.

Royalties

Throughout the booktrade, booksales work on a % discount method to allow publishers, printers, distributors and booksellers to cover their costs.

So how does it work at discovered authors? First the publisher and author set a suitable retail price for your market lets say £8.99 for your brand new 300 page paperback.

Then from that £8.99 various different booksellers get different terms of sale and discounts we generally give the following and always cover fulfilment, packing and postage costs - making us pretty popular all round.

Libraries - 20% Discount - Buying Price based on £8.99 = £7.19
Independent Booksellers - 30% - Buying Price based on £8.99 = £6.29
Chain Bookshops - 40% - Buying Price based on £8.99 = £5.39
Wholesellers - 50% - Buying Price based on £8.99 = £4.50
Amazon - 60% - Buying Price based on £8.99 = £3.60

This 'Buying Price' is known in the industry as 'The Net Sale' and mainstream publishers all pay royalties based on a % of the net sale value - usually between 10-12.5% - so based on the calculations above, ranging from a measly £0.36 to £0.86.

However we decided to make it better for our authors and ignore the Net Sale system - afterall, without you, we'd be pretty lonely. So we pay our authors the best royalties in the business with no complications; no "Your royalty = retail price - print cost / the diameter of the moon" type rubbish.

We make it simple: great for you, great for our maths boffs in royalty accounting. You receive 15% of your retail price on every single sale no matter where it comes from. Let us worry about covering costs and managing discounts. You just relax, safe in the knowledge that you are receiving one simple, generous figure for every book sold. So on our example of a £8.99 book, you receive £1.34.

Pretty good we think, what do you think? Get in touch if you think we can do better. suggestions@fouroclockpress.co.uk

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