Blurb Reviews 193

I attempted to upload my potential book on Blurb Bookwright. I had to upload software 4 times. I could not get the book to save. My screen froze twice. The customer help sent me articles that in no way related to my problem. When I sent info about my screen freezing, unable to save or advance, the reply was " what do you mean by freezing?" A few weeks later i just received an email questioning if my concerns were resolved. This is a horrible website with disgusting customer service.
update 5/12/25. I sent an email base don your reply. I have received a standard reply email that says someone will respond and have been placed on the email list, now received another generic email and request for me to subscribe.

The short story is I do not recommend.

First, the delivery time was much longer than expected. Basically the customer service could not even provide a shipping date.

Then, the book I received was of very poor quality. While the paper is fine, the binding broke apart at the first reading. It is not pleasant to pay about 40$ and hope to get a reference book that will last for a long time and see the pages fall off at the FIRST reading.

A number of my friends are in the art/graphic design business and buy books from you on a regular basis, but we are increasingly annoyed by your logo policy. I now notice that Blurb is automatically adding their logo to a front page and a back page and the cost for removing this logo is expensive, particularly when ordering larger books.

Your logo, in addition, is quite large, noticeable and colourful, much more colourful than most publishing companies logos and so adding it to the book detracts and effects the design of the book. While I am more than happy to mention your printing service to design professionals, as my experience with your company has been mostly agreeable to date, it does not seem fair to have it emblazoned so prominently in more than one location on my book (a practice that most mainstream publishers don't do, and if they do it's a black and white, text only version of their name, not bright cyan) particularly since Blurb didn't take part in the design or distribution of the book and my templates are all customised.

Blurb's books are not the least expensive on the market and while the quality is good, it seems wrong that the printer, particularly when I am paying this much per book, should have this kind of design-control on those important pages.

To finish, it seems like sharp practice to then charge for the removal of the logo, and for the cost of this to increase depending on the size of the book (when the logo size/ ink used doesn't not change whether it's a small or large book). If that's your policy, then we, the book designers should be charging Blurb for putting your logo on our books which we pay to print and distribute at our own expense.

My understanding is the book becomes my property when paid for, and since in addition, I am not selling my books through your online service, but distributing them, as I said, at my own expense, having your logo so prominently displayed is not even useful for the purpose of re-ordering. Also, it is misleading because the staff of Blurb had no part in the design and layout of the book, and all templates are customized to my own specifications.

I am having the matter looked into and may be changing printing to another company which is less intrusive. I hope we may come to an amicable arrangement on this issue of which I am sure you've had other complaints. (May I suggest that you might use a sticker with your logo so the purchaser has the option of leaving or removing, particularly for regular customers.)

Question: I design via Booksmart (my own templates, as mentioned), but read that others who use InDesign you add extra pages with your logo, but BookSmart orders you add your logo to existing pages. Why is this? I would like to know if I am ordering a 40 page book through Booksmart app, if the two pages which include your logo are counted, or if I can add two pages (ie 4 pages if you count back to back) at the same cost as a 40 page book? I don't understand why inDesign users would receive extra pages.

I just created my 4th book. The first two with Booksmart and the latest two with Adobe InDesign 5.5 plug-in. I like both, but the InDesign plug-in offers me the possibility to produce really professional Books with the "freedom" of InDesign and PDF. I needed some Blurb support (not easy to work with InDesign for the first time), and the support was great and they have sent me a replacement book (FOC) after the errors were resolved!
I will continue with Blurb to create "unique" books, and I will use them as showcase to find a publisher to publish my book in offset.
Thanks, Jan Renette

Bon Produit, Livraison du livre OK. Qualité OK, mais j'ai travaillé avec Blurb USA. Je n'ai pas trouvé comment faire dans LR V4 pour imprimer sur une page noir? La vente des albums depuis les USA m'intéresse. Mais comment faire?
Good Product, Delivery of the Book OK even though it came from the USA.. Quality of print Very Good, but I ordered it from Blurb USA to avoid the French. Problems. When I prepared the Book, I could not find the command to print the pictures on a black sheet within the Light Room V4? Selling albums from the USA interests me. But how can I set this up? Its kind of difficult?

Excellent site ...

I love working with Blurb. I get better with each effort and look forward to making more books and family records. The final product is great.

Of course creating the book itself is a personal thing, the mistakes you make are yours - and if you do everything right, the book will be perfect. I have used Blurb for some time now, mostly for portfolio books and I find that their tool is easy to use, the books look professional and delivery is always faster than exected.