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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Nikchick" data-source="post: 1164627" data-attributes="member: 344">I don't have the same perspective on "middlemen" that you do.  I suppose it's true that if you're a one-man show with a couple of releases a year, the percentages paid out to sales and fulfillment companies "cut into profits."Still, I have to say that I don't see Green Ronin's relationship to Osseum that way at all.  We're still a small company as far as "core employees" go, but by having Osseum doing their sales, fulfillment and warehousing for us, it cuts those costs right out.  Sure, we pay Osseum their percentage, but we'd be paying *more* if we hired a full-time sales rep.  More still if we had a sales rep *and* a warehouse/fulfillment/shipping guy. Not to mention the additional costs of warehouse space (since we're long past the point where we could keep all the Green Ronin stock in the garage), or the additional time spent collecting on past due invoices and that whole headache.  I've done all of those things at other companies in the past.Now, that may also be the way we structure Green Ronin's compensation plan that's coming into play as well, and I'll admit that right out.  I'm sure it's *possible* to get someone for dirt cheap and bank on their enthusiasm for the job to get more work than we're paying for, but we don't work that way.  If we hired a full-time sales rep, or a full-time warehouse/fulfillment guy, we would pay that person a respectable salary, and not utilize popular tricks of the industry (such as hiring unpaid "interns" or kids straight out of school for $7.00 an hour).  I firmly believe that for companies to be viable in the long-term, they need to be able to sustain themselves and not rely on volunteer contributions, unpaid labor, or storing everything in the spare room.  Eventually, that unpaid kid is going to go somewhere else.  Or that guy working for $7.00 an hour is going to realize he can make more working at *McDonalds*.  Or that enthusiastic writer you've got churning out 40,000 words a month, every month, is going to find his inspiration dries up, and in those moments you've got to have something more to offer than just the "fun" of working in the industry.I think there are people who started D20 companies who don't think the same way about long-term viability as I do.  But for me, it's not just a matter of asking "Can I sell X,000 copies of this product?" but can you sell enough, month after month, without cutting corners to the point that you're using pallets of product as furniture to "save" on warehouse space, and getting your cousin Timmy to fill orders after school in return for copies of the book to "save" on the sales guy, and getting an enthusiastic fan to write/edit/draw/layout portions of the product for free to "save" on design fees...I think the state of the market right now is going to be least kind to publishers with that kind of set-up, and I'm not convinced that "consolidation" between those publishers is going to change their status or viability in the long run.Nicole</blockquote>

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