[FM Discuss] berlin pricing

[adam hyde]

hi,

following on from the "release early, release often, release
everywhere" chat and the interesting posts that followed (esp. thanks
to chris for interesting deconstruction of the fm 'brand') -  I wanted to
follow up with a question about the pricing of books

At present we have 10 books available. 

We put a mark-up on our books of 2 euro for each. The theory on sales
is :
1. we should sell enough of any one book so that the $ could be used to
fund a book sprint on that topic to update the book
2. we should sell all material at as low a price as possible to try and
get the content out there

However, no one of our books has yet enough $ to fund a sprint. Also, I
am not sure about the tone of this policy so I think we need to rethink
the strategy a little. Which brings me to the interesting question of
'Berlin Pricing'.

In Berlin there are a number of restaurants and bars that offer a very
interesting model. I attended one yesterday in Prenzlauerberg where
entrance was 1 euro, and then you could drink and eat as much as you
want. When you left you paid what you thought was a fair price. A friend
and I had 4 small glasses of wine each and paid 20 euro. That is about
the normal cost for a small glass of cheap wine in Berlin. 

When I paid the 20 I felt good (it might have also been the wine ;) I
didnt feel like I was paying a bill (I could have walked away without
paying anything), I felt I was contributing to something that I
personally supported. I was not obliged to pay, but I did and I felt
better for it.

There are some that would have paid more, and some that would have paid
less, and some that would have paid nothing. There are also those that
pay a little, and when they come back next time with more money then
they are more generous.

The interesting thing apart from the feel good factor (which is very
interesting) is that the model seems to be working. At least anecdotal
evidence shows that the bar is extremely popular with people spilling
out onto the street, and also the bar has been popular and has remained
in business for 5 years now.

Also, 'everyone' knows about the bar because of this pricing model. It
seemed to me that there were also a lot of tourists there which
suggestions word about the bar has spread wider than the local market.

So...I am wondering about our arbitrary 2 euro policy. 2 euro is a
number i picked out of the air, but I have been conflicted about it
almost since we have been selling books. 

It occurs to me that a much stronger model might be to sell all our
books strictly at cost price (ie. at the same price lulu charges to
make them) and offer a model like these Berlin bars. Lulu.com offers
the possibility of uploading and selling PDF. So we could, for example,
offer pdf certificates through lulu.com for the price of 1, 10 and 100
euro.

Then when someone buys a book they may also decide to support us with a
10 euro certificate. Or they may not. They might also decide to buy 10 x
100 euro certificates, or they may not. 

They might also just buy x number of books at cost for their school, or
they might buy no books and buy 5 x 10 euro certificates because they
like what we do. etc.

I think this model has an interesting philosophy at its core :
1. it puts trust in our audience to support us when they can
2. it does not require anyone to spend anything other than the
bare minimum on our content unless they really can

It seems to me this far better realises our original objective with our
books than the 2 euro model.

I think that this model is a very good way to build good will in our
readership. It is a way to build trust and show that we are about what
we say we are about : developing and distributing high quality
documentation about how to use free software. That is, we are not about
selling books for a profit.

Also, by moving the generation of income from profits of book sales to
the certificates, we are actually generating income as a result of the
good will we can generate in our audience. This seems a more
interesting motivation to me - in order to enhance income we have to
enhance the size and depth of the readerships good will.
Thats not a bad idea and keeps us focused on our core ideology and removes
the focus from non-core activities ie. making a profit from selling
books

There is another component to the model which is interesting. I think
in this model all sales of certificates would necessarily be put into a
pool of funds available for funding Book Sprints on any topic. This
seems to me to sit better within the idea of a community like FLOSS
Manuals (as opposed to individualism created when income from a book
gets spent only on a book sprint on that content). It also means that
we could put funds towards book sprints on topics that might not
otherwise attract funding.

Lastly, I think that this model would attract a lot of attention as it's
quite unique. Attention is also not such a bad thing, as any attention
draws more eyes to the content we develop, and also possibly more
participation in developing the content.

I'd be interested in any thoughts on this...

adam








-- 
Adam Hyde
Founder FLOSS Manuals
German mobile : + 49 15 2230 54563
Email : adam at flossmanuals.net
irc: irc.freenode.net #flossmanuals

"Free manuals for free software"
http://www.flossmanuals.net/about