Well when the chips are down; take it out on your customers. I guess it might be said when business is bad, go back to your customers and stick it to them. When a company named Mid-America Publishing, who for whatever reason had to change their name now to Scott Dee Book Packaging and Publishing needs to make money, they decided to charge the customers for the bad times they are experiencing. A couple of years ago my wife decided to take an idea she had and have her own childrens book published. She contacted a company name Mid-America publishing and from the promises on their web site shelled out the 3k. One year later, and a couple of promises we received the books finally. Yes that is right one year. There were times during that year; we could not even contact the company that was full of excuses.By the time we received the proofs for artwork it was almost a year later. At that time, I think I forgot what the book was even about. So excited and with the promises that the publisher reviews the book and artwork, my wife gave the go ahead for publishing and months later the book landed on the door step. When we reviewed the book there was a typo and an artwork mistake. There were missing hands on the children in the book just to name a few. When we contacted the publisher we were told that is was our responsibility to review the proofs and that there was nothing that they could do, until we paid for additional books. Hard as it was for us to try and give the books away and sell a few, my wife held back from doing anything with the book as she was embarrassed of it and the publisher and the illustrator Laurie Faust [email protected]. So we stood by and did nothing until today when the publisher Scott Dee sends my wife an email stating that because we have not purchased any additional books from him he will be destroying our artwork and deleting us from the ISDN database and mark the book as unavailable for publication unless we buy more books from him and buy the artwork and other things for about $1000.00. When we contacted the Publisher stating that we were not happy, they basically told us where we can go and if we did not buy the books, they will be destroyed. Im sure I could get a lawyer and sue this guy and win or not, no one really wins. So I decided to write this article and let other business people know what not to do when your company is on its last leg. Maybe you pick up the phone (Not an email) and see what the two of you can do to help each other in time of desperation. Let your customer know that your business is important and I would like to make some more money off you. Listen to you customers concerns and figure out a way to appease both parties and make both sides feel as though they both win. Well that is not what happened here and when you decide to have a book self punished, you might want to consider another path other then Scott Dee Book Packaging and Publishing or not, but at least you now know what to expect.
Eric
Mount Pleasant, South Carolina
U.S.A.
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