Hey guys, welcome back to The Write Club.
Last week's Thursday, March 6, I was honoured to be among the book industry guests at the launch of HarperCollins' new distribution centre and offices in Robroyston, Glasgow. I have never been impressed by any book related facility the way I was with that magnificent distribution centre.
While Fiona Allen, HarperCollins UK Communication Director was taking myself and my good friend, Tita Berredo on a tour of the facility and giving us the capacity details, something that just kept bouncing on my mind was, the real implications of this for writers, especially indie writers.
I will explain. Since the emergence of ebooks in the early 00s, we have never stopped talking or at least speculating about the demise of print and how ebooks would overshadow prints such that only Grandma's and grandpas would care for print. For some reason, that hasn't happened yet and at the look of things, it's not gonna happen any time soon. I remember while having a chat with a guest from Faber & Faber after the event, I was saying that if HarperCollins sees it fit to make this much investment in print distribution, it speaks so much of the future prospects of print books.
I mean, as far as publishing houses go, it doesn't really get bigger than HarperCollins. They are harmed with massive capital, investment options and most importantly, a deep pool of customer and market data. If anyone able to take a keen look into the business and make a safe educated guess about the direction of the book market, it would be HarperCollins.
From what I know about business, strong, data backed speculations translates into investments. As I walked the massive facility and watched the nearly 150 people who work on the warehouse floor do their thing, I knew I was inside such investment. What this means for writers, I concluded was, the future of print books is bright.
If you are an indie author, don't sleep on your print version strategy. People are still buying print and will continue to buy print for a long time to come.
All the best. Keep writing, keep publishing and start printing. In the words of my friend, Ediale Kingsley, stop stoping and start starting.
