Establishing a Retail Price

First, you must try setting your own retail price for your book. Avoid the publisher that tries to force you into extremely lofty retail prices. In order to sell your book in a retail environment, you must be sure to have your book priced at 2 ½ times your cost.

Large book selling chains expect to make a minimum of 50%. You must also take into account any possible freight fees. So basically if it cost approximately $5 per book to print then you will need to price it at least as $10.95. This will allow you to break even at least. If your book costs more to print, you must raise your retail price in order to break even.

Check to see if your publisher offers something called offset printing also known as traditional printing. Traditional printing is actually the best way to get the best price on a huge volume of books at one given time. Although it is the best way to go it is not offered by most of the large self-publishing companies today.