It
seems like you can get insurance for almost anything – auto, smartphone, home, boat and travel – to protect you against losing your investment. We even have insurance for insurance
companies. What if authors or publishers can purchase book insurance?
Publishers
or authors invest thousands of dollars to acquire, edit, format, print, market
and promote a book. They believe they
are making smart decisions or taking reasonable risks – or they wouldn’t do
what they do. But what if they make a
mistake, double down and take a big hit? What if ego or something else clouded
their judgment?
Maybe
it’s time for authors or publishers to get book insurance. No one sells it and
it may never be available, but could it work under certain circumstances?
Authors,
more than publishers, can’t afford to take too much of a risk when putting out
a book. Some raise funds through sponsors, loans, investors, or crowdfunding
sites, but the vast majority pay out of their pockets. Authors have their business senses clouded by
their ego and personal belief in their writing.
Let’s just say they are quite biased when it comes to judging the
commercial value of the books they pen.
Many
publishers will only publish a book if they are convinced they’ll make their
expenditures up with book sales, rights sales and publicity for their line of
books. If they had insurance to mitigate or remove the prospect of taking a
loss, they’d be more willing to publish other kinds of books that are worthy of
publication but may not appear to be commercial locks.
On
the other hand, maybe authors, and publishers need to force themselves to make
tough decisions of what to publish or bankroll, otherwise they’ll just print
anything and everything without a real concern for finding quality books that
are worth publishing.
Should
we have insurance for consumers of books, or retailers of books? Really, everyone could benefit from some kind
of insurance. Consumers, in order to
chance reading the works of new authors, would feel better if they could be
compensated if a book sucks. Bookstores,
especially small indies, need to use their shelf space wisely and could use a
back-up plan should they not sell as many books as they hoped.
On
the other hand, books are an interesting business model. They offer a lottery ticket to publishers,
authors, and retailers. You never know
which book will take off and sell tons of copies. Maybe that’s the insurance we
have to make up for books that fall short in the marketplace.
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