How The New Book Supply Chain Can Revive Local Books & Bookstores

Before 2020, the term “supply chain” wasn’t a part of our lexicon the same way it is now. Since early 2020, there’s constant talk and news coverage surrounding our supply chain and its many issues. 

The publishing industry, like many others, was hit hard by the pandemic in terms of how difficult it was to receive hard proofs of new books in a timely fashion. As a publisher, author, and sales professional in the printing industry, I felt sucker punched when the government announced a lockdown. I know I wasn’t alone. Like many others, I stopped living and switched to survival mode. I prayed that my years of hard work wouldn’t slip away, knowing much of it was out of my hands. 

In all of the sadness the pandemic brought to our world, it also opened my eyes to the importance of community. It’s something I now see so clearly: Community will save us. I saw firsthand what happened when our printing company pivoted both our mindset and intentions towards the community. Everything changed. 

For example, our team went from traditional printing (e.g., direct mail campaigns, business cards and letterhead, etc) and narrowed our focus. We supplied labels and packaging to other local companies who were unable to import what they needed from their regular suppliers, in addition to introducing our community to other unique print-digital integrations. This, in turn, created new business verticals for us. We went from surviving to thriving, and are now enjoying one of the best years of business in our 36-year history. In fact, we haven’t stopped growing. We’ve even had to bring in new staff and equipment to manage these new demands. 

The success we experienced was the product of a phenomenon known as the Local Multiplier Effect (LME). The LME refers to how many people will spend the same dollar within their own community before it leaves through the purchase of an import. The term “Local Multiplier Effect” was first conceived by economist John Maynard Keynes, and its many benefits are discussed in his book The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money which was published in 1936.  

To provide a book-related example of how the LME works, for every $10 you spend at a local brick-and-mortar bookstore, roughly $13 is generated within your local economy. In other words, the money you just spent locally multiplied in your own community. By contrast, spend that same $10 with a national chain outlet, and you’ll see only $5 in regional output. Spend it on a global ecommerce site, and the regional output will be only $1 … and that’s if they use a local delivery driver to courier your book to you. That’s a huge impact over time when you’re talking in terms of millions of dollars per year.

To put the Local Multiplier Effect into full force for the book and publishing industry, we need to look at an under-utilized yet incredibly powerful tool: the Espresso Book Machine, or EBM. Created by On Demand Books, the EBM prints, collates and binds a single book in just a few minutes—while also uploading it to a cloud. 

While this print-digital technology has been around for more than a decade, it has yet to take off. The machine has its challenges, yes. But I see ample solutions to all those challenges and believe its day has finally come. I believe it is the answer to several of the problems that currently exist within the book supply chain, and will lead to more jobs and more success for brick-and-mortar booksellers as well as hybrid and self-publishing authors. 

How? By bringing the supply chain right inside your local bookstore. With the EBM, more authors than ever before will be published (and yes, those sales numbers get counted toward bestseller lists!). As bookstores make more sales, they’ll be able to hire more people—which they’ll need to run and help people use the machines. 

The beauty of the EBM is that you’re supporting local, and books are getting published to a cloud where they’ll receive maximum exposure. Once a book is available on the EBMs cloud, people in other countries will still be able to order it just like they do from sites like Amazon—only they’ll have it instantly. That means no shipping costs, storage fees, or transit delays. You’ll still be able to promote your book online; but, by redirecting customers to their local EBM, you’re pushing more sales into local economies. 

Bringing the EBM into more bookstores also allows for many more opportunities for local partnerships—from partnering with local printers to supply additional printed goods (like bookmarks and stickers) or a local coffee shop to bring in some of the ambiance that we’ve come to expect with our small bookstores. The possibilities are endless. 

It’s time for those of us in the publishing industry to stop fearing change. Once we embrace this new book supply chain, we’ll begin to see the revolution that hyperlocal and hybrid publishing can ignite. Join me in championing the community and moving forward while eliminating the harmful effects our current supply chain practices (e.g., returnability) have on our environment. One book at a time.