Lulu: Print-on-Demand With a Direct Sales Advantage

When indie authors think about print-on-demand, the conversation usually centers on two platforms: KDP Print for Amazon distribution and IngramSpark for bookstore and library coverage. Lulu is the third major POD platform, and it serves a distinctly different purpose from either of the other two. Where KDP Print optimizes for Amazon and IngramSpark optimizes for the wholesale trade, Lulu optimizes for the author who wants to sell directly to their readers—through Lulu's own storefront, through a Shopify integration, through their own website, or through direct orders that bypass the retail markup entirely.

Lulu is also the platform with the widest range of special print formats: large-format books, photo books, coil-bound editions, premium hardcovers with specialty finishes, calendars, and other formats that KDP Print and IngramSpark do not support. For authors building a direct sales business around special editions, premium reader experiences, or non-standard book formats, Lulu is not optional—it is the primary tool.

What Makes Lulu Different

Lulu was founded in 2002, making it one of the oldest print-on-demand platforms in the industry. Over two decades it has evolved from a basic self-publishing service into a platform with a clear differentiated identity: direct author sales and special format printing. Understanding this differentiation is key to knowing when Lulu belongs in your wide publishing strategy.

The Direct Sales Model

Lulu operates its own reader-facing bookstore at lulu.com where readers can purchase books directly from authors. Unlike Amazon or Barnes and Noble, which are primarily retail aggregators that take a large margin, Lulu's direct storefront gives authors a higher per-copy royalty on sales made through lulu.com. Readers who buy directly on Lulu are supporting the author more directly than through any major retail platform.

More significantly, Lulu supports author-controlled direct selling through what it calls Lulu Direct—an API and integration framework that allows authors to sell books directly from their own websites, Shopify stores, or WooCommerce installations, with Lulu fulfilling the print order on demand. When a reader buys a paperback from your author website, Lulu prints and ships it, and you receive the revenue minus Lulu's printing and fulfillment costs. This is the infrastructure that enables professional direct print sales without an author maintaining physical inventory.

Shopify Integration

Lulu's Shopify integration is one of its most practically useful features for wide authors who are building direct sales businesses. Authors who operate a Shopify store can connect it to Lulu so that print book orders placed on Shopify are automatically routed to Lulu for fulfillment. The reader sees a seamless purchase experience on your store; Lulu handles the printing and shipping behind the scenes; you receive the margin between what the reader paid and Lulu's fulfillment cost.

This Shopify-to-Lulu workflow is how the most sophisticated direct-selling indie authors handle print fulfillment at scale. It eliminates the need to pre-purchase inventory, removes the shipping and warehousing burden from the author, and allows you to sell print books directly at any margin you choose rather than at the retailer-determined royalty rate of Amazon or IngramSpark.

Special Format Printing

Lulu's print format options extend significantly beyond what KDP Print or IngramSpark offer. The platform supports a range of specialty formats that have direct commercial applications for indie authors.

Large-format books—8.5 by 11, 8 by 10, and other oversized formats—are supported by Lulu, making it the right platform for authors producing workbooks, journals, planners, coloring books, art books, cookbooks with large images, or any content that requires a bigger page than standard trade paperback. Photo books with full-bleed color pages are another Lulu specialty, relevant for photographers, travel writers, and anyone producing a visually driven title.

Coil-bound books—the spiral-bound format used for workbooks, reference guides, and educational materials—are available through Lulu and not through most other major POD platforms. For authors producing practical reference content where readers need pages to lie flat on a desk, coil binding is a significant reader experience upgrade that Lulu uniquely enables.

Premium hardcover options with dust jackets, cloth covers, and premium paper stocks give authors tools to create collector-quality editions that command higher price points and create genuine reader desire for physical ownership. These are the editions that show up in crowdfunding campaigns, signed book offerings, and Kickstarter rewards because they are genuinely beautiful objects that readers want to own.

Lulu's Global Distribution

Beyond direct sales, Lulu also offers global retail distribution—making your books available through online retailers and bookstores worldwide through Lulu's distribution network. This distribution is separate from IngramSpark's wholesale network, and the coverage differs in important ways.

Lulu's distribution includes Amazon in multiple countries, Barnes and Noble, and other major online retailers. For authors who already have IngramSpark handling bookstore and library distribution, adding Lulu's global distribution to the same titles creates duplicate retail listings that should generally be avoided. The practical guidance is to use Lulu primarily for direct sales and direct store operations, and rely on IngramSpark for trade distribution to bookstores and libraries.

Authors who are not using IngramSpark and want a simpler single-platform approach for both direct and retail print distribution may find Lulu's combined model attractive. Just understand that Lulu's bookstore distribution is not as deep as IngramSpark's wholesale network in terms of standard trade discount settings, returnability, and librarian ordering systems.

Lulu's Royalty Structure

Lulu's royalty model is based on the manufacturing cost plus a margin. Lulu publishes its printing costs transparently on its website—you can see exactly what each format and page count costs to print before you set your retail price. Your royalty on any sale is the difference between the retail price you set and Lulu's manufacturing cost plus any applicable distribution fees.

For direct sales through Lulu's own store, the royalty is typically higher than on equivalent sales through Amazon or IngramSpark because there is no retail margin being taken. For retail distribution sales, Lulu takes a distribution fee on top of printing cost, reducing the per-copy royalty toward levels comparable to other print platforms.

The key financial planning step before using Lulu is to run the cost calculator on their website for your specific book specifications—format, page count, paper type, color vs. black-and-white—and confirm that your target retail price delivers an acceptable royalty margin. Special formats cost more to print, which must be reflected in higher retail prices.

When to Use Lulu vs. IngramSpark vs. KDP Print

Wide authors who are building a complete print strategy often end up using all three platforms for different purposes. Here is the clearest framework for how to think about each:

KDP Print

Use KDP Print for Amazon-native print distribution. Your Amazon paperback and hardcover should be published through KDP Print because it integrates seamlessly with your Amazon listing and typically produces faster shipping times for Amazon customers. Do not rely on KDP Print for bookstore or library distribution—its expanded distribution does not work well in practice for those channels.

IngramSpark

Use IngramSpark for bookstore and library trade distribution. IngramSpark's wholesale network, standard trade discount settings, and returnability options are what make your book genuinely orderable by bookstores and library systems. This is the platform for your standard trade paperback and hardcover editions intended for the book trade.

Lulu

Use Lulu for direct sales through your author website and Shopify store, for special editions and premium formats (large format, coil-bound, photo books, premium hardcovers), and for any print format that KDP Print and IngramSpark do not support. Lulu is the direct-to-reader print layer in a three-platform print strategy.

Lulu for Special Editions and Crowdfunding

The intersection of Lulu's special format capabilities and the indie author direct sales movement creates a specific high-value use case: crowdfunding campaigns. Authors who run Kickstarter or BackerKit campaigns for special editions—premium hardcovers, illustrated editions, collector sets—frequently use Lulu as the fulfillment backbone for physical rewards. The ability to print a dust-jacketed hardcover with premium paper on demand, ship to a Kickstarter backer list, and receive a high margin per copy makes Lulu the practical infrastructure for crowdfunded physical books.

This crowdfunding-to-Lulu workflow is explored in more depth in the Direct Sales section of this resource series. The point here is that Lulu's format capabilities are not an abstract advantage—they are the physical infrastructure behind many of the most successful direct author sales campaigns.

Setting Up a Lulu Account

Creating a Lulu account is straightforward at lulu.com. After registering, you set up your author or publisher profile, provide payment information for royalty distribution, and begin uploading titles. Lulu accepts PDF files for print books—you will need a print-ready interior PDF formatted to your chosen trim size and a cover PDF or image meeting Lulu's specifications.

Lulu's cover design tools include a basic cover creator for authors who do not have a pre-designed print cover, though professional cover design is strongly recommended for any title where reader perception of quality matters. Lulu's cover calculator helps you determine the correct spine width based on your page count and paper type.

For the Shopify integration, Lulu's app is available in the Shopify App Store. After installing and connecting your Lulu account, you can link your Lulu titles to product listings in your Shopify store and configure the fulfillment workflow so that Shopify orders automatically trigger Lulu print orders.

Common Lulu Mistakes

• Enabling Lulu's global retail distribution on titles already distributed through IngramSpark, creating duplicate bookstore listings

• Not using Lulu's cost calculator before setting prices, resulting in retail prices that are too low to cover printing costs and produce a meaningful royalty

• Missing the Shopify integration opportunity and manually managing print fulfillment instead

• Using only standard trade formats when Lulu's special format options—large format, coil-bound, premium hardcover—are the platform's distinctive advantage

• Not connecting Lulu to ScribeCount and losing visibility into direct print sales alongside ebook income

Conclusion

Lulu is not trying to replace IngramSpark or KDP Print. It occupies a distinct position in the wide author's print strategy: the direct-to-reader layer, the special format enabler, and the Shopify integration backbone. Authors who build a complete print strategy—KDP for Amazon, IngramSpark for the book trade, Lulu for direct sales and premium formats—have the most complete print coverage available to indie publishers. That complete coverage, tracked through ScribeCount alongside ebook and audiobook income, is what a genuinely professional wide author business looks like.

- Randall