Dorchester’s Digital Gamble

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In the newest installment of that painful saga known as the Continuing Convulsions of the Publishing Business in the Twenty-First Century, Dorchester gobsmacked the industry this month by announcing that they are getting out of the ink and paper business. As of September, all Dorchester titles will be available in e-book format only.

Dorchester was the oldest independent mass-market publisher in the United States (“mass-market” is the industry term for a standard-sized paperback). We’re not talking about a small press: Dorchester regularly releases about 30 new books a month. Some 65% of their releases are romances, but they are also significant publishers of horror, Westerns, and thrillers. Their Leisure Books imprint is all horror and thrillers.

So why did Dorchester do this? Well, according to CEO John Prebich, their retail sales fell 25% in 2009, and the figures for 2010 have been even worse. As shelf space for mass-market titles in retail outlets like Walmart shrinks, publishers are having a harder time simply getting their books into stores. About the only part of their business that is doing well is e-books which, according to Prebich, have been showing “remarkable growth” and are expected to “double again” in the next year.

But getting rid of all print books does seem a bit extreme, given that digital sales accounted for only 12% of their total. And while that is significantly higher than the industry-wide average (said to currently be 8%), we’re still talking 88% of their customers who choose to read their books on paper rather than on electronic screens.

Prebich has admitted that the company will be looking at lower revenues, but hopes to make up for that with improved margins. No more warehouse fees. No more printing costs. No more sales force (seven Dorchester sales reps are out there right now, looking for new jobs.) Dorchester is making noises to the effect that e-books that do well may be released later in trade paperback size on a print-on-demand basis, but no one is holding their breath.

In researching this posting, I read that Prebich claims their authors have been “receptive” to the move, which sent me into hysterics. Every author I know who has books with Dorchester and every agent who has a client with books at Dorchester is in fits over the situation. You see, this development also hits authors who have moved on to other houses but whose backlist is still with Dorchester. Part of the concern comes from the perception that Dorchester is teetering on the brink of financial insolvency. There are rumors that many royalty and advance checks are not arriving. I’ve been told that under the terms of Dorchester’s contracts, in the event the company goes under, rights to books will not become part of any bankruptcy settlement but will revert to the individual authors. But the fact is, no author likes to see their books go out of print—or never make it into print in the first place.

Apart from the trauma felt by authors who have books with Dorchester, this development is troubling for the entire industry. Dorchester was known in the business as a house that didn’t pay large advances but was willing to take a chance on books that were “different.” If you were a new author who’d written something “weird” like a romance set in India or ancient Rome, it didn’t matter how wonderful that book was, the fact remained that the big houses were unlikely to even look at it. Dorchester would. Dorchester was publishing paranormal romances when no one else was. Dorchester is the only major publisher that still has a line of horror. Many of today’s bestselling authors, like Sabrina Jeffries, got their start at Dorchester.

If Dorchester goes under, the biggest losers will be the reading public.

(And if you're curious about the picture at the top, it's a photo Amazon's UK warehouse.)