WHAT MAKES INDEPENDENT PUBLISHERS GROUP DIFFERENT FROM OTHER DISTRIBUTORS?

• IPG DOES NOT EARN money unless it sells a book. It has no in-out charges, or warehouse charges for active stock, or charges for sending sample books to its sales reps or to key buyers—to name just a few of the many extra fees charged by most other distributors. A large part of the income of many distributors comes from such fees, which have nothing to do with the distributor's success in actually selling books. Some distributors charge a lower basic fee for their services than does IPG, but when their extra fees are added in, the actual cost is often higher than what IPG charges.



• IPG’s goal is to be as accessible as if we were down the hall from our publishers; clients have easy access to all members of the IPG staff.

• IPG’s return rate averages about 20%—the lowest among the major distributors. This is due to the fact that we are careful not to overload wholesalers and because we put emphasis on getting books into as many stores as possible. IPG examines each return and places more than 80% of them back into stock.



• IPG emphasizes selling books in backlist, oftentimes selling more the second year a title is in print than the first.



• All marketing services provided by IPG are either free, optional, or charged at cost. None are profit centers for IPG. IPG realizes it may or may not be good for a publisher to make a big investment in advertising, or to take space at a trade show, and doesn’t require a publisher to do so.



• IPG gives publishers greater options for publishing into more markets. Publishers can choose to produce titles for the academic, children’s, Spanish, computer, gift, or general trade markets and have each title aggressively sold to the appropriate market. Many titles cross over into multiple markets.



• Because of its buying power, IPG can command favorable rates for advertising, trade shows, publicity, and other marketing opportunities, and it passes all of these savings on to its distributed publishers.

• IPG is financially conservative and consistently profitable and healthy, with no external debt whatsoever. Unlike many distributors, IPG does not pass through to its distributed publishers any uncollectible debts from its customers, or the costs of settling disputes with its customers.



• IPG attends more trade shows than any other distributor, and no publisher is ever asked to pay any part of the cost of having their books displayed or sold at these shows.



• Trade buyers regard IPG’s list as eclectic but not “alternative” or “conservative.” They do not have any preconceptions about the political orientation of the books distributed by IPG.