Kathleen Jones: finding out what happens when you upload your book to Ingram Spark
A couple of months ago I blogged here about my experience of signing up with 'aggregator' Ingram Spark, recommended by the Alliance of Independent Authors. Then, a few weeks ago I received an invitation to a presentation at Ingram headquarters in Milton Keynes and a tour of their printing works at Lightning Source. Always curious to know the path from my uploaded manuscript to the printed page I happily accepted, even though it meant a 5am start from the Lake District. Neil, as the Book Mill editor, came with me to investigate the techie side of things. We weren’t disappointed. Andy Bromley, their ‘front man’ for indie authors, gave a fascinating presentation into Ingram’s history and its plans for the future. Ingram was established in 1964 by John Ingram as a private company. They started out in logistics, moved into digital content and publishing and are now going into Robotic technology. In 1997 they acquired Lightning Source as a Print On Dema...