Digital

Short-run book printing is one of the key growth areas in the digital sector, but its development is being hampered by book publishers failing to grasp the reality of the situation in which they find themselves. While digital capability has shot up over the past five years, publishers have been slow to recognise and implement the opportunities it brings.

Environmental issues, cost and convenience have driven the market for digital book printing over the past three years. Currently, the digital print market is estimated to account for 175bn of the total 1.8tr pages printed worldwide annually. According to recent research, the digital book market will grow to 400bn pages, around 25% of the total market, by 2015.

Increased volume
Falling run lengths are digital’s opportunity and research conducted in the German book market shows why digital book printing can be advantageous. Börsen­verein des Deutschen Buch­handels found that between 2002 and 2006, the number of new titles on the market rose from 78,900 to 94,976 and average run lengths fell from 6,570 to 5,030.

In the UK, 3% of titles make up 50% of total sales, and 10% of titles make up 90% of total volume, which suggests that 90% of books are slow-moving niche titles.

Traditionally, publishers have been forced to pay for the storage of these books and the pulping costs associated with any left over stock. With digital printing, the risk of over production and excessive storage costs are eliminated. Both short-run and on-demand printing enable publishers to mitigate risk and reduce costs.

Were a publisher to anticipate sales of between 15,000 and 17,000, an initial conservative print run of 15,000 could be ordered via offset and then digital could handle additional demand on a short­­-­­run or individual basis.

‘Surge sale’ titles, such as celebrity biographies, could also significantly benefit from on-demand and short-run printing. Sales of these books, heavily subject to a highly whimsical readership, are notoriously difficult to predict. Many a publisher has been left staring at a warehouse full of a celebrity’s unsold vacuous outpourings following negative headlines or bad reviews.

Economic concerns
However, publishers’ misgivings about the economics of digital book printing are holding back the market. Alan Mahar of Birmingham-based independent publisher Tindal Street Press, says: “We have investigated on-demand book printing, but it just wasn’t cost effective.”

Chris Downs, senior production manager at publisher Wiley Blackwells, adds: “I can’t see a total transfer being possible for some time, as most of our books are still printed with litho as digital just does not make sense financially.”

Competitive alternative
However, competition and technological advancements are driving down costs, making on-demand book printing a more viable option for all publishers. For instance, Océ’s new continuous feed VarioStream 9710 prints at speeds of up to 1,425 per minute and Xerox last month took the wraps off the 650/1300 printer, capable of 1,232 duplex monochrome A4 images per minute.

Cut sheet machines are getting faster too, with Océ’s 6200 series and Xerox’s Nuvera currently flying the flag. Finishing lines are also enabling faster and more cost-effective short-run production. Muller Martini’s SigmaLine is an ‘all-in-one’ line providing everything from printing to binding.

Printondemand-worldwide.com is one company that has set its stall to capture the short-run book market. Director Dale Burgess says the run lengths have in­­creased dramatically over the past five years: “It used to be that digital was only competitive on runs of up to 500, that figure now is 2,000.”

Digital growth
Neil Allatt, finance and business performance director at book printer Biddles, also notes the growth: “As run lengths and digital costs fall, titles will increasingly fall into the digital framework.”

As environmentally friendly printing becomes more of an issue for all of us, the market for short-run book printing will soar. In 2004, Notting­ham-based Paper Hub Recycling estimated that 300,000 books are shredded every week, a total of more than 1m a month. In addition, litho printing uses more ink and chemicals than digital.

Writing in The Times Higher Education Supplement last year, environmental scientist and author David Reay said: “What with production and transport, the average paperback has eaten its way through 4.5kWh of energy by the time it gets to a reader. In terms of climate impact, this is equivalent to about 3kg of carbon dioxide emissions for every glossy new textbook.

In the piece, Reay estimated that the book market produced around 600,000 tonnes of carbon emissions each year, and “enough pulped books to fill the dining hall at Hogwart’s several times over.”

If publishers can switch on to the benefits of digital book printing, there’s every chance that criticisms such as these will become a thing of the past.