Lulu Direct

Lulu is by far the best and nicest company I've ever worked with. They continuously put authors' and book-publishers' needs and concerns at the top of their list. The book quality is perfect and the process is smooth and easy. The results are great and the integration with Shopify works without a glitch. And, if you have any questions or doubts Lulu personel is the nicest, most helpful people there is, while at the same time being very good at what they do! We have never had any problems with Lulu whatsoever. The few times our customers have complained is when books have not arrived – which is never Lulu's fault (but UPS's). And even at those times, Lulu has been very helpful. I would recommend Lulu to absolutely everyone! You will not find a better company.

Recommended. The app works well. So far, all orders have been fulfulled properly. There have been one or two minor problems which customer service have handled well and promptly. In general customer service is excellent. There are some downsides to consider before using the app:
- Orders to some locations seem to arrive very slowly... some took around three weeks. Need to let customers know. They will see the shipping time but this doesn't include production time to actually print the book. - There is basically no functionality for looking through your own orders and gathering data, even just how much you've actually given Lulu. You have to email them to ask for a csv file (which they do provide promptly)
- More costly than manually ordering from Lulu or making a bulk order. However I am glad I am using the app, despite these limitations

I wanted to sell paperbacks of my own books at a discount independent of the larger companies if you know what I mean. Lulu looked good. I contacted them with my concerns and they assured me I would be pleased and there's no contract. The quality of the books is great. My readers have told me so and I have ordered them myself at cost by momentarily dropping the price on my products page on Shopify.
The only problem left was constantly having to correct shipping prices both foreign and domestic. I contacted Cary Penrose who called me at my request and patiently talked me through setting up live shipping worldwide. It worked and now my readers in England can order delivery any way they want. I find Lulu very convenient and have had no complaints about pricing or delivery. I have just started advertising internationally, so time will tell how this works out when the volume picks up.