dipity. press - COMING SOON: JAN-MARCH
a third extension of dipity publications will be opening up soonish
We’re Kickstarting Chapbooks in 2024!
Hi guys! I’m going to create a separate chapbook or Dipity Press section on this Substack. Sorry, I can’t type out everything — taking a slight break from typing so will do an additional longer voiceover message at the top but outline a few things in the text. The voiceover at the top has a few unusual hiccups in it too sorry in advance didn’t have time to redo it.
Listen above to the voiceover or read below:
I’m going to open up chapbook submissions sometime very very soon within the next 1-3 months (could be as soon as this January or early February or might get pushed into March at the latest) will know soon. There is no exact date yet because I’m finalizing a few things. I would prefer to award a huge cash amount to each poet and everyone should truly be paid for their work, but can’t yet — on average from each issue get between $2-4 back so PoD printing costs subtraction there, then the distribution fees take a huge chunk away about 89-95%. We also at this moment don’t keep general subs open year-round, but might be able to for half the year in the distant future or longer with added volunteer staff.
Again we may be able to one day switch to this new PoD for magazine issues but I think it limits us to just Amazon not the other online bookstores are included (actually I take that back there may be two other online bookstores it goes to), but for now, we’ll just use them for chapbooks. I’m not naming this second PoD yet because a few things aren’t finalized and it’s a new setup so too early to tell if we’ll have an official long-term listing and distribution partnership essentially with them.
I was researching fellow presses from different parts of the world the past few weeks and quite a bit last year it seems on average those who charge sub fees or contests ranges anywhere between $6-$28, $15-25, or some have a pay-what-you-want option.
I TRULY hate fees but we can’t facilitate 100% free chapbook subs. We’re going to try an initial sub-fee of most likely $11 and then allow for two chapbook manuscripts for $22 etc. and may have an expedited decision option. P.S. Do note chapbook sub fees may be subject to change as I finalize a few more calculations but it’ll definitely be between $11-$15. Keep in mind Submittable also takes a fee so we don’t get exactly $11, $12 etc. for each submission too, and have a Submittable monthly bill.
In each open chapbook submission window, we’ll choose a guaranteed minimum of one chapbook from the submissions that come through but could certainly choose more 2-5, etc. depending upon — the volume of subs we may close windows early hitting our caps. If need be we will adjust the submission fee or guidelines in the future.
Why this particular number — well it’s not because my birthday is January 11th rather the new print provider for these chapbooks has an additional global distribution option that is between $20-$35 per title and a few other discounted plans for more than one title each month and then we will be offering payment most likely in the form of a minimum of 5 physical saddle stitch bound copies in the signage agreement. We hope to have these out on Amazon physically to order more, do global distribution, plus make digital versions available through our site shop until we can also do eBooks — separate from the dipity site shop. I think that almost down-the-middle sub-fee is pretty fair.
We will see how everything goes. I typically get test samples or see how the customer service is etc. I do have 2-3 other backup options to print these chapbooks to support global shipping too in the event anything odd happens down the road but have heard nothing but good things and have reached out to their customer support to verify a few things.
Originally, I intended to have Dipity Press to be a digital-only library out on Amazon and in our site shop but others still love physical copies and I do too. I would say I’m a def fan of Ghost City Press’s setup where others can send donations to a poet and it appears the the micro chaps or series are set to $0.00 for PDFs plus chapbooks have a donation button beneath too. We might be able to do PayPal donation buttons possibly, no guarantees but will see what’s possible to support poets’ chapbooks and work that we accept further in the future. I think we may be able to facilitate chapbook eBooks through this new PoD one and maybe more as they add more features to their services section. I did compare local print providers next door but it was not what I was looking for and I reached out to a few others out of state too. There was one back in my home state MN too but international shipping was really steep and they had higher minimum order quantities. As time goes on, we may be able to bump up physical copies to 10, 20, etc. hopefully or one day involve a cash amount.
[Example of Ghost City Press’s Awesome Setup]
Now we might be able to do this might — give all purchases of any digital copies to a poets PayPal so they would get 100% from digital-only purchases at the end of each month and typically the margins from print are very little. OR I don’t know if we can through Fourthwall or somewhere on our website facilitate a donate to poet link or name labeling button somehow to track those but will look into that otherwise, payment will be in the form of at least 5 physical copies, and publication for now and maybe if we grow or get funded we could start paying poets for both online and print, etc publications. Ongoing royalties can be tough to manage for a small press so some presses stick to one-time payment awards or physical copies as payment. I will see what we can do starting out…
The submission guidelines drafted for this will be available to read soon on how many poems and pages it must be plus other requirements. We will be accepting only previously unpublished poetry for this. You can read more FAQs on dipity’s website what we consider as previously unpublished work and I’ll add some new questions regarding chapbooks in the near future (where you scroll toward the bottom of the Submit page).
I would say I would prefer to produce handmade chapbooks from scratch and do everything in-house printing-wise wise start to finish, but we can’t do that, unfortunately. I took a fun book-making binding workshop class a long time ago when I was little in Minnesota where we made the book pages from recycled materials and then bound them by hand. I can’t remember exactly where that class was it may have been something similar to the Minnesota Center for Book Arts or somewhere near the Loft Literary Center or close to the Mill City Museum back then. I learned how to make recycled paper too if recall with a framed screen — was fun back then!
Anyways it’s a tad easier to leverage print-on-demand when you can’t facilitate the printing yourself and are shipping outside of the U.S. too. I’m excited to launch Dipity Press — I’ll post on social media a bit less but I will def try to send another post out when chapbook subs are open or share a few more writer tips and resources articles per feedback!
OTHER NEWS
I love sharing photos when poets receive print issues from time to time. Julie Marie in Wisconsin (@ quiet_thescene) on Instagram finally received issue no. 1’s reboot INK DWELLERS RERUN back from 2022! BTW You can get a paperback edition on Amazon for just $6 now, and can also be ordered in hardcover. The paperback price on issue 1’s reboot has gone way down and so has issue no. 2. It’ll be a little bit before issue no. 3 and no. 4 qualify for deep discounts. I will be trimming down future issue length sizes to accommodate any unforseen increases in printing and distribution fees especially when we are required to change paper types.
Remember we will be extending the Symphonic Challenge — since we do not have the minimum amount of entries yet to make a decision. Also, we’re looking for more spoken word poetry submissions and tattoo poetry! Thanks so much for your support! Have awesome days ahead!
— Jazz Marie Kaur aka VFORROW
Movie I Watched Recently
Society of Snow (2023) on Netflix: My VFORROW Rating 4.8 out of 5.
It's a January 11th birthday coning up for the EIC of Dipity Lit - - - - shhhh!
So send her some CASH donations in the next 48 hours (& avoid the florist or gift shop).