45 Tips for Sourcing Work Overseas
December 2005
As publishers continuously seek to cut costs, many are exploring sourcing work overseas—from manufacturing to content management services, among other tasks. If you're considering this, arm yourself with the information you need to evaluate potential partners and determine whether an overseas partnership will work for you.
BookTech Magazine asked industry experts with experience in evaluating offshore partners and working overseas in different capacities to share their tips:
Determining if offshoring is right for you.
To determine whether you will benefit from manufacturing offshore, consider:
1 If you're publishing one-color trade paperbacks or four-color jobs that can run on a U.S. web press, stay home.
2 Jobs requiring quick turnaround are likely to run late, so stay home.
3 Jobs requiring specialized colored or textured paper, stay home.
4 For illustrated books requiring high-quality reproduction, look overseas.
5 If you're publishing books-plus, mechanical binding, odd/oversize books, look overseas.
—George Dick, president, Four Colour Imports Ltd.
What applications should you outsource?
Considering outsourcing business applications? These tips can help you decide which applications to outsource and what is best kept in the United States:
6 Offshore existing applications/clusters with a high cost to maintain.
7 Offshore existing applications/clusters that require conversion.
8 Groups of redundant applications that require consolidation to a single appli-cation are ideal for sourcing overseas.
9 Strategic and life-critical applications are not advisable to source overseas.
10 Hyper-dynamic applications are also best kept close to home.
11 Applications/clusters with fewer than eight people are not usually worth sending offshore.
—Rakesh Gupta, chairman & co-founder, TechBooks
What projects are ideal?
12 In addition to manufacturing costs, consider the book's retail price, the paper, whether it will require multiple vendors (overseas or back and forth to the United States) to put multiple components of a book product together, and timing.
13 Consider a book's print run and weight. Books with higher page counts (200 and up) and larger print runs (75,000-plus) are usually best kept in the United States due to shipping costs.
—BookTech Magazine
Deciding on a country.
Ask your peers which countries they have had favorable experiences with in outsourcing. One expert suggests:
14 Canada offers slightly lower pricing, and quick, reliable delivery by truck.
15 Mexico and South America offer faster delivery than Asia at better prices than North America [for many jobs]. Quality control remains an issue.
16 England and Europe generally offer competitive pricing when the U.S. dollar is strong, faster delivery than Asia, and generally speak English well.
BookTech Magazine asked industry experts with experience in evaluating offshore partners and working overseas in different capacities to share their tips:
Determining if offshoring is right for you.
To determine whether you will benefit from manufacturing offshore, consider:
1 If you're publishing one-color trade paperbacks or four-color jobs that can run on a U.S. web press, stay home.
2 Jobs requiring quick turnaround are likely to run late, so stay home.
3 Jobs requiring specialized colored or textured paper, stay home.
4 For illustrated books requiring high-quality reproduction, look overseas.
5 If you're publishing books-plus, mechanical binding, odd/oversize books, look overseas.
—George Dick, president, Four Colour Imports Ltd.
What applications should you outsource?
Considering outsourcing business applications? These tips can help you decide which applications to outsource and what is best kept in the United States:
6 Offshore existing applications/clusters with a high cost to maintain.
7 Offshore existing applications/clusters that require conversion.
8 Groups of redundant applications that require consolidation to a single appli-cation are ideal for sourcing overseas.
9 Strategic and life-critical applications are not advisable to source overseas.
10 Hyper-dynamic applications are also best kept close to home.
11 Applications/clusters with fewer than eight people are not usually worth sending offshore.
—Rakesh Gupta, chairman & co-founder, TechBooks
What projects are ideal?
12 In addition to manufacturing costs, consider the book's retail price, the paper, whether it will require multiple vendors (overseas or back and forth to the United States) to put multiple components of a book product together, and timing.
13 Consider a book's print run and weight. Books with higher page counts (200 and up) and larger print runs (75,000-plus) are usually best kept in the United States due to shipping costs.
—BookTech Magazine
Deciding on a country.
Ask your peers which countries they have had favorable experiences with in outsourcing. One expert suggests:
14 Canada offers slightly lower pricing, and quick, reliable delivery by truck.
15 Mexico and South America offer faster delivery than Asia at better prices than North America [for many jobs]. Quality control remains an issue.
16 England and Europe generally offer competitive pricing when the U.S. dollar is strong, faster delivery than Asia, and generally speak English well.
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