No matter what compelled you to write and publish your book, earning a profit from selling your book can be satisfying on a personal, professional, and spiritual level. Of course, there are no promises on how much money you will earn from your book, but here at Cloverly Christian, we want to help you every step of the way and will not make any money until you turn a profit.
The profit structure is slightly different between print or eBooks. Below is a comprehensive breakdown of the differences in the formats and what it means for you as an author.
Physical Print Books
In order to sell your physical print book in any retail store around the world, we need to go through a wholesaler. The largest and most trusted wholesaler in the industry is Ingram Content Group. For your Christian book, in particular, we work with Ingram’s Christian-owned subsidiary, Spring Arbor, to target distribution to the right audiences. Cloverly Christian uses Ingram to get your book as far and wide as possible.
Barnes & Noble, Amazon, and any small mom-and-pop bookshop goes through a wholesaler to stock and sell their books. Ingram, therefore, will be the one who initially buys all the copies of your book from us, with additional sales at the individual retailers conducted separately. After Ingram buys the book from us, they set a retail price for sale for interested consumers.
After Ingram determines the retail price of the book, that is the standard price a consumer will pay. The retail price, in turn, determines the wholesale price, which is the cut that we receive on your behalf. Our agreement with Ingram sets the wholesale price at 50% of the retail price. This is the industry standard.
For example, if the retail price is set at $16, each sale yields $8 (half of $16) for us. From the wholesale price we receive from each sale, the printing cost of each book has to be accounted for before the profit is passed on to you. For a $16 book, the estimated printing cost per book is $4. Therefore, a book sold for a retail price of $16 will result in $4 in your pocket per sale, after printing costs and the wholesale price are considered.
However, once Ingram establishes a retail price, the wholesale price is locked in, even if the book is actually sold under retail price. There is no change in your profits for a retailer selling the book under retail price. Say a bookseller sells your book for $10 instead of $16, we still receive the entire wholesale price of $8 per sale then account for the printing costs, leaving your take as the same $4 as when the book sold for $16. Of course, Ingram and the retailers want to maximize profits, but their arrangement has no bearing whatsoever on your profit at the end of the day.
Digital eBooks
Compared to the profit sharing for print books, profits from eBooks are much easier to calculate because there is no need for Ingram’s service as a wholesaler. eBooks have no physical print version that needs to be created, so there are no printing costs at all for the digital eBook file. Further, we are able to directly contract with the retailers to sell the eBook.
Amazon, Apple, Google, and Barnes & Noble are some of the major retailers who sell eBooks, and the profit from all of them runs the same way. We are able to directly post the eBook for sale on their platforms in exchange for a 30% share of each book sold. That leaves 70% for us to directly pass on to you. As always, you receive all proceeds from sales for two years after publishing and until you make a profit on your initial investment.
eBooks also tend to have lower retail prices for consumers, making it more economical for your audience to purchase. If your digital eBook sells for $10, the platform only receives a $3 fee, leaving $7 for us to pass on directly to you.
Due to the lower costs of publishing and selling eBooks, in addition to the lower cost for consumers, we encourage those sales. Either way, you will receive all the profits you are entitled to.
A visual summary of the profit breakdown for either print books or digital eBooks can be found here.
