Misplaced sentiment and other indulgences

Well, here we are, nearly a week into a new year and those new beginnings I mentioned still seem to be a long time coming. Mainly because there are still – still – so many loose ends to tie up before the old life finally fades into memory.

 Main preoccupation since the daily round started up again has been ‘reducing stock levels’. If I’m honest, this is just the distributors’ kind way of saying, ‘How soon can we put all these old books of yours in the shredder?’

 Anyone who was following Dead Guy back in summer 2008 when we were forced, backs against the wall, metaphorical gun to our heads, to cull, i.e. pulp, a proportion of old stock for the first time will know that just typing the word gives me acute physical pain. At that time people bombarded me with suggestions for alternative ways of disposing of the books, but unfortunately no one came up with any idea that we hadn’t already looked at very hard. Sometimes the drastic and painful solution is the only viable one.

 And so it is at the moment. The facts are these: in a few weeks Crème de la Crime will be launched as an imprint of Severn House, and the publishing company formerly known as Crème de la Crime will cease to exist and its former owners will no longer be allowed to market books under that name. Realistically, in that time we’re not going to sell more than handful of books over a year old. Which means we’re highly unlikely to make enough from them to cover the cost of storing them. Which means they’re costing us money at a time when we’re no longer earning any. Donating them to libraries, charities or any other good cause would incur delivery charges – same problem. Our authors aren’t famous, so remainder merchants don’t want to know.

 The choices are:

1. Give them to the authors if they will pay the delivery charge.

2. Pulp them. This hurts me a lot more than it hurts you.

 The authors mostly feel much as I do, and they don’t mind paying a few pounds for delivery, but the problem with 1 is that authors tend to live in normal-sized houses, and in a variation of Parkinson’s Law, they’ve already expanded to fit the available space. They can accommodate a couple of boxfuls but no more. And when they’ve got them, what do they do with them? One has already sent me a regretful e-mail citing misplaced sentiment as the only reason she can think of for taking more than a few dozen.

 Maybe my own sentiment is a tad misplaced too. But maybe not. Supermarkets and big bookshop chains seem able to regard books in the same light as jars of jam on a shelf, to be offered for sale until their sell-by date, then unceremoniously dumped. Try as I might, I can’t do that. I know I have to do the dumping part, or at least authorise someone else to do it, but don’t ask me to stop feeling bad about it!

Comments

[Texanne]

Misplaced sentiment it may be, but it's still awfully sad. Hope things get better soon.

[michael]

Sell them at a reduced price. Say 99 cents (plus shipping).

First, your writer needs to be on this.

Make the price change for a limited time.

This will increase the author's readers base, many who will pay full price for the author's next book.

Cost and profit margins are not involved here. This is a written off loss. Do you want to get rid of the books and receive nothing or virtually nothing except a few dollars and new readers?

[Dale Spindel]

Just how many books are we talking about here? I'm feeling your pain and wish I could come up with a brilliant solution but, alas, nothing is coming to mind.