Whilst you are waiting for your book to arrive, if you’re anything like me, your mind starts to wander.
If your wandering gets you wondering what the meaning of life is, it’s still 42. If you’re wondering what the secret to a perfect soufflé is, I’m afraid I can’t help you.
But if you’re wondering what happens after you click to confirm your order, wonder no more!
The simplicity of digital books
When you purchase a book, a digital book you get a digital version of your book — instantly! Ready to go straight to the lucky recipient. Then it can be shared far and wide to family and friends.
So far, so simple. But what about the old school physical book? Well, then the process has a few more steps.
Reviewing books with ninja speed and accuracy
I sat down with our very own Customer Happiness Team to map out the journey your book takes from being created on your computer to arriving in the post.
Theresa leads our small but mighty team, which consists of Iustina, and Quique. They are all super friendly and endlessly helpful. And that’s pretty much the motto of the team.
After you complete your purchase, your order joins a polite and orderly queue (we are, after all, a British company), ready to be reviewed by the team.
The team is as fast and precise as ninjas. They are able to review thousands of books a day and can spot an error from a thousand paces.
When reviewing a book, the member of the team will go through the whole thing, page by page. They are looking out for anything that doesn’t look right. Sometimes they find font size problems, artwork that doesn’t load right, or typos in the text.
We love technology, but we haven’t given up the fight to our robot overlords yet. So – very occasionally – something slips through the net. Which is when we get a chance to make things right, and play Human After All on the office speakers.
Only when they are completely happy that your book is A-OK do they approve it for the next stage of its journey.
Get ready for the printing process
Once approved, your book joins another orderly queue in the system used by our printers. At this point, you’ll receive an email containing a digital preview version of your approved book.
Your book waits patiently in the printer’s queue for an hour. This gives you a chance to have one final check through. If you do spot any errors at the last minute, you can let us know and we’ll get things straightened out.
Then your book enters the printing process. Depending on which finish you selected (softback, hardback, or deluxe), books take between 2-3 working days to print.
Our printer’s machines print 25 books at a time. Seeing it in action is quite the sight to behold.
And so, a book is born. Hurrah! Your book is ready for its life as a fully printed, beautifully personalised keepsake.
From the printer to the postman to you
Your freshly printed book is carefully hand packed and then readied for collection by the Royal Mail (or, for upgraded shipping, the courier service).
Once it’s been collected, your book wings its way to you, fresh and ready for the lucky duck you’ve created it for. Books being delivered to a mainland UK, Australia or US address tend to arrive within a week of being picked up by the post service.
All that’s left for you to do is put on your homemade cape* and prepare to be a gift hero.
*You do that too, right? It’s not just me who insists on giving gifts in a full Marvel style costume complete with cape, mask and self drawn logo… is it?
4 Comments
Have received the book made for my Husbands 80th. Birthday. He will be very pleased with it. Just an idea, could they have a little more kind humour? Also, as they’re advertised here perhaps an English edition could be formulated as some of the features are very Ameeican
Hi Margaret! Glad to hear the book you made has arrived safe and sound. Fingers crossed your husband just loves it!
Not quite sure what you mean by kind humour – could you let me know a bit more what you mean? The books are well stuffed with puns and other groaners… because that’s what we like ourselves. I swear we have other fine qualities. We make a mean cup of tea.
And, believe it or not, we’re founded by three British dads 🙂 I wonder if you might have accidentally gotten onto the US version of our site – we have two versions of all of our books, one stuffed full of beans-on-toast for the Brits, and the other slathered in BBQ sauce for the Yanks. You can see which version of the site you’re on by checking the little flag in the top right corner of the page.
How do I access the digital version of the book I made as there was an option to upload a video clip? I didn’t at that point but now want to. I believe my book – going direct to my sister- is currently being printed.
Hi Sherry! I’ve just forwarded your message to the customer service guys so that they can hook you up with your digital book 🙂 Watch for a message from them in your inbox!