Mitchell Davis '93 + Bob Holt '81 + Jason Youmans '02
If they hadn't previously struck gold in the publishing industry, you might think the booksellers at Bibliolife were crazy. After all, most of Bibliolife's products were written more than 75 years ago and fell into such low demand they went out of print. They sell no first editions of these books, just reprints. Indeed, Bibliolife is happy to sell a handful of copies of any title.
But listen to Bob Holt '81, Mitchell Davis '93 and Jason Youmans '02 pitch their unique business model from their office overlooking the Charleston Harbor, and it's plain they have a few tricks up their sleeves. The three men worked together at Charleston-based vanity press BookSurge (which Holt and Davis cofounded) before Amazon bought it in 2005. Now, with the help of five other College alumni that work for Bibliolife, they're teaming up to build another on-demand printing company in Charleston, this time for out-of-print books with expired copyrights, most of which were published in the United States before 1923. They operate under the slogan "Old books. New life," and their goal is to put out-of-print books back in the hands of readers.
Like other on-demand publishing companies, Bibliolife has no inventory and warehouses to manage, and no unsold books sitting on its shelves. Instead, all of its books are stored digitally. When a customer orders a copy, Bibliolife retrieves it on a disk, prints it and ships it.
Bibliolife gathers the bulk of its collection of titles by striking deals with libraries. Using Bibliolife's equipment, libraries scan their collections of out-of-print books and give the company the right to print and sell the works. In exchange, Bibliolife preserves a digital copy of the out-of-print books, grants a wider audience access to the work and shares some of its profits when those books sell.
"For libraries, it's a perpetual revenue stream," says Holt, Bibliolife's CEO.
Such arrangements have resulted in the availability of thousands of titles, including books like S. Emma Edmond's Nurse and Spy in Union Army (1865) and C.H. Charles' Love Letters of Great Men and Women: From the Eighteenth Century to the Present Day (1924). Bibliolife sells books in 41 languages, and some published as early as the 15th century. Bibliolife also prints modern government reports and plans to have maps, scrolls and manuscripts available soon for print.
Bibliolife's executives confess that they have great difficulty predicting which books they acquire will sell, and are reconciled to the fact that many books might never sell at all. They're mum on how many titles of each book they need to sell to break even, but are confident that by selling a few titles of many, many selections, their business can be a success.
"Our definition of a best-seller is totally different," says Davis.
And how many of these best-sellers have they actually read?
"We don't," says Holt.
"I've looked through a few," says Davis.
"Too busy working," says Youmans. 