Blurb

First of all everyone was completely accurate when they say that Blurb's customer service is terrible. I tried so hard to find a phone number so that I could speak with an actual person and I had NO luck. You have to send an email if you have a question so if you're trying to crank out something quickly - you're just out of luck and need to figure it out on your own. Secondly, I wish it was as user friendly as Word or Pages. My daughter was working on a book for a school project and it seemed as though she was constantly re-centering the work and estimating the distance for the margins. Although there is a pink border on the tentative document that serves as a guide, I wish the margins (especially top and bottom) were as easy to create as they are in Word or Pages. Without specifically being able to set your margins for all text to a certain distance, there's no real uniformity between the pages which can be seen subtly on the final project that arrived. The color in the graphics (photos) also weren't as vibrant as I had hoped. Good but not great. I do appreciate Blurb getting my daughters book to her before the estimated arrival so in that respect they were quite good and the book that arrived was in great condition (no bends, tears or issues). Overall Blurb is decent for what it offers but there are so many ways in which it could be better and I will probably have my other daughter use another company when it's time to do her project next year.

I thought I could create a book using the blurb software, pay the price to receive my high resolution pdf for interior and cover, and then upload them to Ingram where I normally publish my books. Blurb requires the ISBN to do this, but they don't tell you that they're actually registering the ISBN with them, which means I can't publish it anywhere else. They have an option to publish through Ingram but through them, but they gouge you on the cost of production so that I'd have to inflate the price to 150% of the normal price in order to make a $1 profit per book.

Blurb used to be an okay place to print self-published books... they make decent ebooks and a digital book preview and magazines. However, there are a lot of issues that ruin the Blurb experience. For one, do not expect to get your revenue from Blurb from orders customers purchase directly from the site. It is going on to two years and I still haven't received a payout for the purchases made. TWO YEARS!

Secondly, this last order they shorted me 2 books! I reached out about it, and I haven't got a call or an email response. Additionally, many of the books are damaged. When I reached out about that, no response AT ALL! When you call the phone number, it rings but no one ever answers.

So essentially they stole money from me on two different fronts. From the sales I have made, they never payout. And they shorted me in my order.

I am very angry. I needed these books for a show, and now I don't have enough books to meet the RSVP requests and I will have to present damaged goods.

The Amazon process is also a joke. There is no clear explanation as to how the books get on Amazon or with Barnes and Noble. It doesn't appear to be a solid process, so it makes no sense for them to advertise it.

Great Site - Excellent site for portafolio and books. The price are great. Is creative, and finest photography books I see. You can see the exaple fo the diferrent book they have. I love this side.

MAyra

Recently made a first year photo album for my second son, and was all set to upload when I realized I didn't have something right about the format (wanted a lay flat option). Reached out to Blurb and then sent me prompt, friendly, personal, detailed instructions that answered my question to the letter. Wow! Additionally, after a horrible UPS experience, I expressed I was anxious about the fact they use UPS and was worried I'd be slapped with another hefty fee (which FYI, never pay - learn about "self clear" when it's coming to you internationally!) but no! Not with Blurb, and they assured me of this. YES, they're expensive but WOW when I received my book in the mail it was perfect. Exception quality, so wonderful packaged. You really feel like you've created an heirloom. This is my third album I've done with them - one for my wedding, and both my boys first years. I can't wait for my kids to flip through this newest one. Thank you, Blurb for being ones that still offer real customer service. Nope, totally not paid for this. I was just stunned by the vast difference between UPS and Blurb, and so grateful there are still businesses built on integrity.

I never got as far as ordering my photo book after hours laying out 70+ pages. It wasn't until I reached the night photos that I realized all the files had been compressed, really vibrant photos had the dull, murky look of being seen through a haze, and when I looked back over the day photos, they were also poor quality. I'm a pro photographer, and a Blurb book would have made a mess of my work. I can't imagine who could be happy with the finished product! Add to that the fact that no one is reachable; I know a lot of business works this way, but there are stages in this process a quick question would have saved me a lot of time and stress. Reading the reviews of troubles with the company fixing mistakes makes me feel I really dodged an expensive bullet when I stopped. I'll know how to research a better book making option now that I've seen the worst.

UPDATE: A really infuriating non-responsive reply from Blurb to my review. Telling me that representatives were available 24 hours a day is not quite true, you must communicate via email, my response time was next day on all queries. No response to my assertion that the photo files had been compressed and would significantly lose quality in the reproduction. And false sympathy, about 'how frustrating it can be to spend hours and not achieve the results you want.' This was not my shortcoming; it is a direct consequence of the Bookwright software. To imply someone is always there to help ignores the reality that you cannot reach anyone by phone or internet chat. I would rather they had not responded at all, than shovel this bs.

I got so frustrated with this site I almost gave up on my project multiple times, so I cannot recommend it. This review should be taken with a grain of salt, because I never did go through and receive a final product but I believe there are too many limitations for Blurb to be useful to the casual photo/custom-book maker, mainly:

1.) You can't change the size of your selected book once you start making the book (ie. Started uploading photos). You can literally spend hours selecting and uploading photos, only to have to do it all over again if you find that your desired photo placement requires a portrait oriented book rather than a landscape oriented one, or if you need a bigger size book etc.

2.) The bookify interface is simply not very user-friendly. It takes ages to figure out how to do things that should be clear, like, how to delete a photo, or move a page in your book arrangement.

I also can't recommend the website because although I bought a groupon that said I had $45 to use towards any custom-book project on the site, Blurb tried to charge me separately for shipping. Note that according to my groupon, only tax and gratuity were excluded. There was no mention of having to pay $8 to $20 extra for shipping, even if I had enough groupon promotional credit left over once my book was finished. I tried to sort it out with Blurb's customer service, but was not satisfied with the weasely way they tried to insist shipping was not covered by the groupon's value. I ended up not finishing my project, and instead called up Groupon, who gave me a refund.

Being faced with Apple's decision to drop Aperture support - and their photo-book making opportunities with it [no, Photos. App is *not* a replacement for Aperture, if you're working with RAW images] and thought I'd have a go at creating a book using Blurb BookWright.

What a bum PoS is that. Importing ~170 photos took about half an hour. Fine, I can live with that. Then, when you actually add an image to the album, it takes another 20 to 30 seconds. For adding a single image. Either the import should be slow, or actually inserting into the album should be slow but not both.

Then I went on to create. On the first page I wanted one (1) image and two (2) text boxes. That crashed the app. (Actually I wanted three columns of text because that looks better. But I gave up on that.)

Then, a week later, I decided to give it some more time. Still on page 1: I started adding text and link two text boxes such that it would flow, like it was two-column text. Then tried to save the book, not wanting to loose changes I made: it refused to save because "there were errors". Well, thanks guys!

Closing the application and restarting will let you continue but then when started to add a few more images on page 2 and 3, it *again* wouldn't let me save the book, "because of errors". FFS.

Please stay away from this.

I just had tried to purchase a single book I need on priority that I have written for my college children's book class. It was supposed to be a single book single purchase for roughly 45 dollars. All went smooth until I went to the check-out section where I gave the COMPLETE CORRECT credentials for debit card, to be told that the bank's zip code was wrong (which it isn't). I tried again thinking I had made a mistake with the actually 16 digit or SCC, and it still referred to the bank's zip location. I thought that it wasn't a big until I check my account activity to see TWO pending charges of 45 dollars, without any order confirmation or receipt to justify as to why I was charged this as the order went through. Now, in all likelihood, my book will be late and my young children I'm partnered with to give the book to will be left sad without one while his classmate's enjoy theirs. All due to the incompetence, lack of solid communication methods, and integrity of this company. Take your business elsewhere. My complaint number is: *******. Get back to me immediately.

Their customer service is seriously lacking. I cant believe they don't have some way of reaching them other than email. Good luck if you are having trouble and need to cancel a book. When you are ordering your book there should be a disclaimer that you have to agree to before purchase. I found out the hard way. You have to cancel an order within an hour or you are just out of luck. You mean to tell me that at 6 pm you have someone there processing the order and if I canceled it at 8pm it has already been made. I don't think that is fair. I could see if I ordering it during business hours. I am beyond frustrated with this company. The response time for email is way too long. They have closed my issues without even responding to me or notifying me. I can't say enough how disappointed I am with this company. Please don't waste your time. My book came damaged, not due to shipping, and had marks and rips. I wish I could take my money elsewhere. They won't issue a refund. Terrible customer service; if your only means of help is via email there should be someone that checks it every hour or at least every few hours. AVOID this company!

I have been telling my children a Christmas tale i made up for over 30 years and decided this year as a gift I would put the story in print for my granddaughters. After looking at different options for printing I chose Blurb as they seemed to offer the most economical option for a few books. Downloading their Bookwright software was easy, figuring out the layouts etc was painless. Uploading everything to their site was a breeze. I did contact support at one point while waiting for the books and found them to be fantastic. I had a response from 'Celeste' to an email query within an hour and over the next week while the books were in production I contacted Celeste several times to confirm certain things and each time I received a response very quickly. I received the books and couldn't be more pleased. They are great quality, picture colors are true to what I had envisioned, and they were a huge hit this Christmas. I am already ordering more for extended family and friends. I give Blurb and their support team a huge thumbs up!

I have personally sold NUMEROUS copies of my book to friends and family through Amazon.com orders, and Blurb is stating that I have only sold TWO COPIES of my book! This is completely impossible since I have personally signed numerous physical copes of my book for friends and family!

I have tried to log in this morning and it says they can't find my email address, username or password, to be honest I am very disappointed because I've worked very hard on the books I've uploaded and I am selling through your platform.
I haven't had an email with an warning it there is anything wrong, when there was something wrong you've emailed me and it was fixed, now all of the sudden I can't access my account, I was very happy the other day because I've got my sales for February and they looked really good and now I cannot access my account, I am very upset with all this, this is my business and I hope you understand why I am so upset with this issue, at least tell me if it's something to do with me so I can fix it on my side, it's only fair.

Although Blurb print products is good - I have always used premium paper and all + options, I am very disappointed with their customer service. When trying to upload the PDFs of my books I paid for, the data is corrupted and cannot be uploaded or saved. A contact with customer is only possible via blurb site and of course with no answer ( not even an auto-reply). A telefone contact or chat line is also not available. Very disappointing. After more than 30 printed books I will no longer work with Blurb. Other good alternatives are available (in Germany) such as PHOTOBOX or ALBELLI with great products and customer service.

I had one book printed by Blurb that was OK, but another I submitted was so terribly printed I was embarrassed to have it for sale online. When I tried to get the quality issues addressed it turned into a 4-month nightmare. Twice it was over 4 weeks before my complaints were answered, and when they finally were the customer service employee tried to shove responsibility on me. When that didn't work, they reprinted the order and the books were even worse! The covers not only had a strong magenta tinge, but the spines were wrinkled. Interior pages had incorrect margins and slanting margins - most off by 1/8-3/8 of an inch, and some off by as much as a half-inch. I complained again, they did a second reprint. The covers of the second reprint had a worse magenta tinge, and only one book had acceptable interior pages.
I complained again and asked if a different "print partner" could be given my book since the one that had it consistently did very substandard work. This question was never answered and the customer service person who finally answered my complaint now claimed the issues I was upset about fell within "the range of variation that we can expect." This statement flatly contradicted what I had been previously told - that Blurb considered 1/16 of an inch "acceptable variation." The printing issues I was complaining about were errors from 2/16 up to 8/16ths.
I write science books, and I worried the deplorable print quality of the books being sold would negatively impact my professional reputation as well as that of my coauthor. When I received no response to my question about my book being given to a different print partner I asked for it to be removed from Blurb's Global Distribution Network. Two weeks later it still hasn't been.

Never managed to download ebook I paid for. Poor /nil support - never got anywhere - just lost money. Still waiting for reply.

Ordered a book of poems, was supposed to be here by the 18th (which was almost three weeks after I ordered it) and it never did arrive. Buyer beware.

I've been selling my books personally and through the help of Blurb manual ordering for my customers. So far so good until I found out they have been selling my book to the Global Retail Network when I had made a request to remove it since I wasn't familiar with the system yet.

Due to their neglect in handling this request, the book continued to be picked up by retail stores and Amazon, but I didn't get any royalties because the profit section has not been filled out. Again, I made the request to remove my book. The only blame I can put on myself is that I didn't check my Sales Overview whenever I'm logged in to my Blurb account, but to my knowledge they had agreed to remove it so I never touch that area. I had an instinct to check it, and lo and behold, my book has been selling for months, without a profit made to me. I made 80 sales and no notifications that this was happening. 80 sales from what I calculated would be around $1000.

I told them they shouldn't be approving books without a set profit. How is that any fair to the author? They must know that no author would just give their books for free. So now they earned from it, retailers earned from it, but the author didn't. A few back and forth e-mails later, all they can do is repeat to me the things I already know, and they couldn't even give me any sort of appeasement to the unclaimed profits.

They fully remove themselves from the situation when they know that their system allowed my book to go through without the Profit being filled, and that I had requested for it to be removed. Their system didn't alert any errors. So they put the full responsibility to the author.

Please see the exchange I had with them. Customer service is very cold especially Mary. The escalation to her didn't bring me any resolution, and I am now upset more than ever.

If you're going to sell with Blurb, make sure you set your profits because their system is not foolproof, and they don't care about what you earn or don't earn as long as they did.

The site rejects my password, does not send re-set links and has made it impossible to place an order. I have tried for two days now with no success.

Thankfully blurb ended up responding after several days and gave me gift cards so that I can replace my orders.

15€ of shipping for 11€ of product? And 12days to recive the magazine? Out of USA your services is very very bad

Warning to all who lost their accounts (banned) - the company reactivates it after several moth and sells your stuff without paying you!

My order of 21 books never showed up. I have contacted blurb several times regarding my order. Via Facebook and email. No one has gotten back to me regarding my order. I also have contacted blurb about several other issues. Ex) I couldn't see my Amazon sales, why my book priced on Amazon increased from the original listed price I set, as well as many other issues. All I have received is generic emails not answering any of my questions or concerns.

After a full week past the expected delivery date (still no books) lead to the cancellation of my book signing. Which led me to be publicly humiliated since I promoted the event all over social media. I disputed the charges like anyone else would. (Mind you the dispute hasn't been resolved) so guess what Blurb did!?! In this very moment I can't even log into my account. It now states my book and account doesn't exist! I'm sitting here trying to wrap my head around the fact that my account is deactivated. My book has also been mysteriously taken down from the bookstore but not Amazon. (I'm sure because they can continue to steal my book sales) I received a email that stated "why didn't I contact Blurb when my books didn't arrive." I DID! Which is insane! I still haven't even received any information about not receiving a statement or sales margin from my Amazon sales. Does Blurb think a Author wouldn't want to see their sale!?!? How can I receive my royalties from Amazon and Blurb bookstore if blurb doesn't have my account information? I had orders attached to that account; will my customers receive their purchases? Will I still receive a royalty check for my amazon sales? This company is unprofessional, a joke, and embezzlers. How can they randomly take someone's account down without paying them the money they have earned... we all learned this in kindergarten; all of this calls for a lawsuit... just in case this company wasn't aware that they are stealing from their customers. Overall I don't recommend anyone publish with Blurb unless you want them to take full advantage of you.