GLITCH

I should have seen it coming. 

As I have mentioned before, Secrets of a Summer Village is published by two publishers: Lulu and CreateSpace.  While I am slightly happier with the quality of printing provided by Lulu, the CreateSpace version is much less expensive.  That said, it's cheaper and faster for me to buy Lulu copies here in Europe, because Lulu has a printer in France, and postage is cheaper from France to Germany (where I live) than it is from the US.

When I was signing up for everything in the first place, I understood that the Lulu version could be distributed to all of the international Amazons through its "Global Distribution" package.  It wasn't clear to me that the CreateSpace version would be available outside of the United States, so I thought that I'd use both as publishers.


Apparently, I was wrong about the distribution of CreateSpace books.  They do get to all of the international Amazons, to Barnes and Noble, to the Book Depository, etc..., and they get there MUCH FASTER.  I know that now.  Unfortunately.  Because I got an e-mail from my Aunt yesterday telling me that my book suddenly costs over $20.00 (US) on Amazon, when it used to cost around $10.  After some research, I realized that the Lulu version has now somehow taken over the listing at Amazon.com.  The cheaper version is still available, if you click around a bit, but it's not obvious.  Except in my version, below, with the pink piggy bank and pink arrow.

I have contacted Lulu.com, and am trying to remove my book from their Global Distribution package.  Unfortunately, it's not so easy to do unless I completely withdraw the book from Lulu, which I don't want to do.  So I hope that people don't see this ridiculous price and get turned off by it.  It's on Lulu.com for me.  It's on CreateSpace for everyone else.

I wish I had figured this out earlier, but this whole experience is a learning process for me, and I am very thankful to my aunt for alerting me to it.  It really brings to light the fact that Lulu's pricing structure is not competitive.  If you buy from their site AND live in the US, you can take advantage of some super deals directly on their website.  They have these "money saving" deals at least once a month.  BUT they are only valid in US dollars, and only from their website, so Amazon purchases do not benefit, and nor does anyone outside of the United States.  To me, this is a HUGE disadvantage of Lulu.  Even with their "great" sales, the prices aren't much better than CreateSpace.  I think that CreateSpace has a competitive advantage here, unless Lulu changes their pricing structure.  Clearly, as it stands, they have built the discounts into the inflated prices.

Not a happy customer here.