Frostburn at DriveThruRPG

[Rasyr]

This is also being discussed over on rpg.net and one poster there reminded everybody of Steve Wieck's comment about WW's pricing their products near MSRP because they did not want to hurt their print book sales.

This got me to thinking that perhaps the pricing policies (note: the publisher can set prices, but if they don't, then DTRPG does) are the way they are in order to try an eventually kill the PDF market, and drive for more print product sales. Just unfounded speculation, I know, but however small, it is still a possibility.

However, I personallly feel that PDFs are going to be a major asset of the future, and that the DRM and silly pricing practices can only hurt. It makes me think of a company that is trying to prevent advances in order to keep their business model intact, something that has happened time and time again over the years (i.e. the VCR).

As most folks know, I work for ICE. Well, we started selling PDFs (with zeal) about the same time as DTRPG, but ours do not contain DRM, and our pricing policy is to price the PDF at about 50%-60% of the MSRP. I am happy to say that not only has our PDF business been doing well, but also our print sales have slowly been increasing as well.

I occassionally check out kazaa for ICE products, and over the past several months have actually seen a decrease in the number of ICE products. To me this says that the majority of the piracy has been because of an unfulfilled need. We now fill that need with high quality, non-DRM, fully usable PDFs, and our sales have gone up because of it and I believe that the piracy of our products has gone down.

 

[D'karr]

This got me to thinking that perhaps the pricing policies (note: the publisher can set prices, but if they don't, then DTRPG does) are the way they are in order to try an eventually kill the PDF market, and drive for more print product sales. Just unfounded speculation, I know, but however small, it is still a possibility.

The only problem with that business model is that you only kill your own PDF market. In this case WotC's. Everyone else is still keeping competitive prices, meanwhile WotC prices itself right out of the market.

 

[Li Shenron]

The only problem with that business model is that you only kill your own PDF market. In this case WotC's. Everyone else is still keeping competitive prices, meanwhile WotC prices itself right out of the market.

I am still not sure how inconvenient it is... maybe they have PDF backups of all their products, I suppose books are nowadays always written in electronic form and THEN put to print If that is true, perhaps for WotC the cost to produce the PDF book is almost zero per copy, and even finding only 100 customers to buy it would generate a little but useful income.

 

[D'karr]

I am still not sure how inconvenient it is... maybe they have PDF backups of all their products, I suppose books are nowadays always written in electronic form and THEN put to print If that is true, perhaps for WotC the cost to produce the PDF book is almost zero per copy, and even finding only 100 customers to buy it would generate a little but useful income.

I think you misunderstood my comment. By pricing their product at a non-competitive price with PDF products from other publishers WotC does not kill the PDF market for those publishers. It simply kills its competitveness in that market.

 

[Rasyr]

The only problem with that business model is that you only kill your own PDF market. In this case WotC's. Everyone else is still keeping competitive prices, meanwhile WotC prices itself right out of the market.

Not everybody else. There were comments about other companies who have extremely high prices (compared to MSRP) as well. However, it again causes the speculation as to whether or not killing the PDF market is part of the purpose....

I am still not sure how inconvenient it is... maybe they have PDF backups of all their products, I suppose books are nowadays always written in electronic form and THEN put to print If that is true, perhaps for WotC the cost to produce the PDF book is almost zero per copy, and even finding only 100 customers to buy it would generate a little but useful income.

I cannot speak for them, but I know that the printers that we currently use (at least until we get our own digital printing equipment in a few months) requires that the manuscripts and covers both be delivered to them in a high resolution PDF.

The PDFs that we sell are at a lesser resolution to help keep the sizes down (both for ease of downloading and for the amount of space they would require on the servers).

I know that the proofing process we use actually has us making several different pdfs (which we then proof) prior to making the print versions....

 

[Scribble]

I don't speak for DriveThru but what do you mean, what's their take? They provide a service that WotC has purchased. WotC sends a PDF to DriveThru and says "sell this for $xx.xx". DriveThru adds the DRM and puts it on their website with the listed pricetag. The private agreement between DriveThru and WotC most like states that DriveThru keeps a percentage of all sales and passes the net income to WotC.

Here's what I meant. I don't know exactly how the PDF market works so I want to hear from DriveThru on the pricing. My comment was prompted basically by someone saying they don't even pay MSRP for the print edition.

Basically in a retail store with a print book it works like this: WOTC makes the book, and sets an MSRP. They then sell massive copies of the book to a Distributor for a lot off. I believe soemwhere in the range of 60%? The Distributor then sells it to a group of FLGS for Somwhere in the neighborhood of 40% off cover price. The FLGS then sells it to YOU at normally MSRP.

The game store COULD if it wanted to sell it at 10% 20% or even 30% off and still make a SMALL profit. That's how amazon and walmart work. They only make a very small profit each sale, but since they are so big it adds up.

SO my question to drivethru, or any PDF DRM sales team. How does the pricing work?

 

[Corporal_Cupcake]

A wrinkle

I just visited drivethrurpg and saw no reference at all to this fabulous "agreement" with WOTC. I also didn't note any link to WOTC products on the left-side menu, the one with the publishers listed. Wonder what's up with that?

 

[Fiery James]

Here's what I meant. I don't know exactly how the PDF market works so I want to hear from DriveThru on the pricing. My comment was prompted basically by someone saying they don't even pay MSRP for the print edition.

Basically in a retail store with a print book it works like this: WOTC makes the book, and sets an MSRP. They then sell massive copies of the book to a Distributor for a lot off. I believe soemwhere in the range of 60%? The Distributor then sells it to a group of FLGS for Somwhere in the neighborhood of 40% off cover price. The FLGS then sells it to YOU at normally MSRP.

The game store COULD if it wanted to sell it at 10% 20% or even 30% off and still make a SMALL profit. That's how amazon and walmart work. They only make a very small profit each sale, but since they are so big it adds up.

SO my question to drivethru, or any PDF DRM sales team. How does the pricing work?

The company (WotC, in this case) sets the selling price for the PDF. DTRPG gets a percentage of that.

- JB

 

[Scribble]

I stand corrected then Fiery James. Thanks.

In any case I still have a feeling that Wizards probably didn't want to get into the PDF business, and finally gave in so long as the PDF itself was given all "current" protections and sold at MSRP so as not to cut too deeply into their actual focus.

Also to those worried that picking a product like frostburn is a bad test. Well, I'm sure they realize what type of product frostburn is. They'll compare the PDF sales with their Print sales of that particular product. They won't compare the PDF sales of Frostburn with say, print sales of the Player's Handbook...

 

[jeffh]

I just visited drivethrurpg and saw no reference at all to this fabulous "agreement" with WOTC. I also didn't note any link to WOTC products on the left-side menu, the one with the publishers listed. Wonder what's up with that?

???

Right at the very top of the page, smack in the middle, first thing you see. There's a big WotC logo, a picture of the cover of Frostburn, and in between is a short blurb about the agreement. This is exactly the way I remember it being on Wednesday.

I did notice that WotC isn't in the menu on the left, which is odd. Maybe it's because they only plan to have Frostburn up for a month or so - they're not really one of Drivethru's regular suppliers, so to speak.