What Makes a $100 Book?

When we produced our book, Rockbridge: A Photographic Essay, there was a debate about price.  I guess we could have actually sat down and done the math in terms of time and film and processing, pro-rated out equipment and gas and production (editing, cropping, etc.), as well as the obvious expense of getting the damn thing printed and shipped from China.  But if we were that good with money ... well, we wouldn't have gone broke in the meantime.

So instead, we just tried to choose a price point that would get us the maximum amount of income without hitting a chill point for the buyer.  $39.95 seemed about right, and that became the cover price.  (You can get it, by the way, at local Lexington, Virginia, bookstores, or on Amazon, or even from the publisher -- makes a great Christmas present.)

Since then, I've seen it pop up on the rare book sites for as much as $107, apparently because it was an autographed copy.  Wow.  I've only paid that much for a book once ... and regretted it.

It was a photographic history, written on a subject that is critically important, in my opinion, but inadequately covered.  In other words, it's the only book about it.  Why so vague?  Because I'm about to be cruel.

You see, the book was written by amateurs -- amateur historians and amateur writers.  It's horribly organized and poorly written, wandering from subject to subject, scrambling events in apparently random non-chronological order.  It's packed with illustrations, most of which I have seen nowhere else, but they're laid out like a 19th Century page of classifieds: wildly cast upon the page as if handled by cats or monkeys.

And yet, I paid over $100 for it, unknowing at the time what a disaster it is.  Nonetheless, perhaps I was extreme in saying I regretted it.  I wish I had paid less -- much less -- but I am happy I own the book.  It really has a great deal of useful information buried within its chaotic pages, information I've seen only in sources that cite this book.

Now, there is a new book, Leica 99 Years, for a neat $130.  (I wonder what the additional $31 are for.  Wait for it, the joke will come to you ...)  Its gotten good reviews from the Leicaratti, and it does look beautiful.  I would be tempted ... but for the price.  Seriously.  $130?

Of course, using my own equation, your average Leica buyer had a pretty high chill point.  I mean, $7,000 for a camera body ... without the $1,000 lens.  But, for what appears to be a coffee table book of pretty pictures, a celebration of just, well, being cool enough to be Leica?

I suspect the cover price was chosen in a more sophisticated, perhaps Machiavellian,  version of the process we used.  It's expensive because it's something from Leica.  The brand's image must be maintained.

Yet, in my lizard heart of hearts, I know that I would buy the damn thing if I could afford it.  What a sucker.

Maybe I can scam a review copy ...