Hi Guys i am new here so be gentile on me 
Just come across LULU today and it sounds wonderful, so just checking if I have understood everything:
1) lulu will charge you the unit price for producing the book plus 20% of the profit margin that you set, and that is for 1 book or 100 books, and there are no other costs?
2) What is the best paper etc options for children's books 16 pages in the format of 1 page text 1 page picture/ drawings? I want a price target of £4-£5 (all inclusive) max and this needs to be in color
3) If I set up my LULU store page and customers buy directly from there how long before they get the book that they ordered? (roughly)
1 - All other costs are optional extras that are up to you if you want to take advantage of them or not. I say Extras because it can al work well even without them. I think if you order, say, 10 or more of the same books at the same time there is a small discount.
2 - You do not actually get much in the way of paper choices. It is all done by PC controlled machines so is kept as 'simple' as possible. Most people manage OK with what is avialable though.
3 - it is very variable even though it says 1 - 3 or something. It depends on the type of book, where that type is printed and where the buyer lives. Like most 'mail-order' Items, I allow up to 21 days. Do not forget that no one will know your books are here unless you tell them. That applies to even Amazon when you end up on there. You still need to be able to market your books yourself even though lulu have free and paid-for tools that can help you.
You need to spend a good long time reading all of the site and getting to know all the FAQs etc. Here is a start based on Number '2' >> http://connect.lulu.com/t5/Product-Information/Wha
Good luck.
First you need to be aware that colour books are expensive.
A 16 page book of say 7.44"x9.68" or 6"x9" would cost about 2.66 pounds.
That is what you would pay plus 2.99 postage if you bought it yourself.
You could set a selling price of 4.95 which customers would pay again plus the 2.99 postage nd you'd make about a pound per copy as your own revenue.
You would have to drive any customers to the Lulu Author Spotlight (used to be called a Storefront) but they won't find it by accident.
Whether you order a book or a customer orders a book it will tkae about a week for them to receive it - 3 days to print and 3-4 days for the post.
Ken Anderson - The Lulu'ers Professor
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Dowan,
Ordering in bulk wil create you some savings but you will first be paying the shipping costs of the bulk order to your address, then you will have to repack and ship each book individually.
A better way is for you you to take orders on your own web site and then place each order on Lulu for direct delivery to the end customer.
Yes, you have to pay the fixed shipping cost but was you buy the books at cost price you can afford to reduce the cost you charge your customer to offset the postage. Say reduce the piostage the postage charged the customer by 1 pound and cut your margin by 1 pound.
An advantage of this is that Lulu occassionally offer 20% off or free shipping deals and if you grab one of those at the same time as you are processsing an order you suddenly make a little extra.
Ken Anderson - The Lulu'ers Professor
