Lulu is the platform that takes that seriously. A memoir for a family, a hundred copies for an organisation, a single beautifully bound book, it handles all of it without requiring you to enter a retail catalogue.
Most publishing platforms assume the destination is a shop. Lulu does not: it is built around print-on-demand first, with retail distribution as something you switch on if you want it. That makes it the natural home for books whose readership is known and finite.
It also offers a wider range of formats and bindings than the retail-first platforms (hardback, photo books, calendars, unusual trims) which matters when the object itself is part of the point. And when you do want retail, the same title can be pushed out to the major channels.
The mix here depends more than usual on what the book is for. A legacy memoir and a title going to retail want almost opposite configurations.
- 01
Publication setup
Account creation, project setup, file upload and the format and binding choices, where Lulu offers more than the retail-first platforms do.
- 02
Editing
A professional editorial pass before printing. Worth doing even for a private edition, because a printed book is permanent in a way a file is not.
- 03
Cover design
A full cover built to the exact spine width your page count and paper produce, for the binding you have chosen.
- 04
Marketing
For titles going to retail: listing metadata, categories and a promotion plan. Skipped entirely, and honestly, for books with a known readership.
- 05
Print and distribution
Paper, trim and interior typesetting chosen for the object you want, plus distribution to the major retail channels if and when you want it.
Four things that matter on a platform built around the printed object.
- 01
Told what you need
Clear communication about which parts of the process your book actually requires. A private family edition does not need a marketing plan, and you will not be sold one.
- 02
Priced to the job
Affordable, and quoted for the work in front of us. Many Lulu projects are small by design, and they are treated as such rather than padded to a package.
- 03
The format decisions
Lulu's range of bindings and trims is its advantage and its complication. Choosing well is a design decision, and it is made with you.
- 04
Retail when you want it
Distribution to the major retail channels is available and optional. You can start private and open it up later without starting again.
Eight steps, and you hold a proof before anything is finalised.
Manuscript preparation
The manuscript refined and made ready for typesetting, whatever condition it arrives in.
Account setup
Your Lulu account created and configured in your name.
Book setup
The project created, with book details entered and the interior and cover files uploaded.
Choosing the format
Trim, binding, paper and colour decided, the choices that determine what the finished object feels like and what each copy costs to print.
Pricing and distribution
Price set, and the decision made about whether the title enters retail distribution at all. Both answers are legitimate.
Proof
A physical proof produced for you to hold and approve. On a platform this focused on the object, this step is the most important one.
Promotion
For retail titles, the listing and launch material prepared. For private editions, skipped.
Publish and monitor
The title made live, with sales tracked where there are sales to track.
A few of the people the house has worked with, in their own words.
I had eleven years of notes and no book. What I got back read like me on a good day, my turns of phrase, my arguments, and none of the padding I would have added myself. The first chapter arrived and I stopped worrying.
Marianne ElleryIndependent author The structural edit was not comfortable reading. It told me the second half started in the wrong place, which I had suspected for a year and nobody had said out loud. Moving three chapters fixed a problem I had been trying to solve with better sentences.
Devon AlukoIndependent author What sold me was being told I did not need half of what I had asked for. I came in wanting the full package and left with a cover, a proofread and an honest explanation of why the rest would not have helped yet.
Priya RaghunathanIndependent author Three cover directions, all of them plausible, none of them the thing I had described. The one I picked worked at the size that actually matters, I could recognise it in a list of forty other books, which is more than I can say for my first attempt.
Tobias HearnIndependent author I own the book outright and that was written down before I paid anything. After two years of being quoted percentages by people who would not put them in writing, that was the whole reason I stayed.
Cecile MarchandIndependent author The audiobook took longer than I expected and they told me why each time rather than going quiet. The narrator they cast got my grandmother's accent right, which I had assumed would be the thing I had to let go of.
Nathan BoakyeIndependent author
How Lulu works, and who it suits.
It is a print-on-demand self-publishing platform. You upload your interior and cover files, choose a format and binding, and copies are printed as they are ordered, by you, or by readers. You can keep the book entirely private, sell it through Lulu's own store, or push it into wider retail distribution.
Two things. The range of formats and bindings is wider than the retail-first platforms offer, including hardback and unusual trims, which matters when the physical object is part of the point. And retail distribution is optional rather than assumed, so a book with a known, finite readership can simply be printed without entering a catalogue at all.
Yes. Lulu offers distribution to the major retail channels, which you switch on if you want it. It is worth knowing that going out through an aggregator is not always identical to publishing direct on each platform (the royalty split and the control over the listing differ) so for a title whose main market is one retailer, publishing there directly may serve you better.
Creating and uploading a project is free. You pay the printing cost of each copy, which depends on trim, page count, colour and binding, and Lulu takes a share of any sales through its store or distribution. Lulu publishes a pricing calculator, and the figures change, so check its current rates rather than a number quoted here.
Yes, as on every platform. Lulu has content guidelines and requires that you hold the rights to everything in the book, text and images both. Material that infringes copyright, or that falls outside its content policy, will be declined. If you have any doubt about permissions for something in your book, raise it before production rather than after.
You do, completely. The author holds 100% of the rights to their work, in every format, for its whole life. The house is paid for the work it does, not with a share of the book. That is the arrangement the house reopened in 2008 to offer, and it does not change with the tier, the price or the point at which you come to us.
Yes. Your name is on the cover and in the record. Everyone who works on the book (writer, editor, designer) works on your book, and none of them is credited on it unless you ask for them to be.
Yes. Your story is yours, and nothing about the project leaves the house. We will sign your NDA before you send anything, or supply ours if you would rather use one.
No. Six disciplines are available and you take the ones you need. Authors arrive here at every stage (with an idea, a half-draft, or a finished manuscript that only needs a cover and a shelf) and the work starts where you actually are.
It depends on the work: length, how much research is involved, how much of the book already exists, and which disciplines you need. There is no list price for a book, and any firm who gives you one before reading your material is quoting something other than your book. Tell us where you are and we will price the actual job.
Move the marker. You do not need to know what to call it: you only need to know where you are.
Tell us where your manuscript is, where you want it to go, and we'll show you what's possible.