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Since our plea for help during July 2004, we raised $19,000 of the $34,000 we needed to setup and operate the 2 Xerox Docutechs and other bindery equipment. We managed to get the first Docutech online in August 2004, began delivering one-volume Interlinear Bibles in September, 2004 but had such a backlog of orders, we weren't able to keep up with demand. It is great that we had so much demand, but it is terrible that so many of our customers had to wait many months before receiving their Bibles. In fact we still have over 350 backorders for the four volume Interlinear Bible sets from Spring 2005 that we are still trying to fill. We acquired a second Docutech and got it into production at the beginning of November 2004.
As is usual with any start-up operation (printing the Interlinear Bibles in house) we encountered a number of unforeseen problems. All of the hard cover binding is done by an outside bindery. The first bindery that we selected couldn't keep up with our production. He promised us 750 volumes per week but only produced 375 volumes per week. Finally during December, some of his equipment broke down, resulting in this bindery not delivering us any volumes in the last 3 1/2 weeks of December. Obviously, this is the absolute worse time of the year for this to happen. As of the week of December 18, 2004, we had no less than 3,800 volumes on his floor waiting to be bound. Bear in mind that these were all volumes that were promised for Christmas delivery. Based on the production results when his equipment was operating (375 volumes per week) it would take this binder another 10 weeks to bind what was on his floor.
The last week of December, we located and started using another much larger bindery that could produce 1,000 volumes a week. However, their lag time is four weeks. In other words each volume takes four week to complete its process, but after the first four weeks, and assuming we deliver 1,000 volumes a week to them, they could put out 1,000 volumes per week. This bindery has worked out pretty well. Unfortunately, as the other bindery already had us 3,800 volumes in the hole, it took us into June to get mostly caught up.
There were other problems that arose along the way. The Docutechs require major maintenance every 1,000,000 impressions and as we were printing 1,000,000+ sheets a month on the Docutechs, they required major maintenance monthly. In addition to this the Docutechs are prone to other more minor breakdowns which cost us more than we anticipated in maintenance costs and owntime. During the nine months we have had both machines, we have probably only had four weeks that both machines ran all week without a breakdown of some kind. Still, they got the job done when we had no other way of getting it done. But these extra maintenenace costs which we didn't foresee, kept eating away at our bank balance leaving us constantly operating on a shoestring and unable to accumulate funds. The repair and maintenance costs on the Docutechs ran anywhere from $6,000 to $10,000 a month.
Our Xerox service contracts on the Docutechs have expired which should cut our $6,000 to $10,000 per month in maintenance costs in half. We have located a Christian Docutech technician (27 years experience) in Merrillville, Indiana who is willing and able to service our Docutechs and show us where and how to obtain the necessary consumable parts & supplies for about half of what we were required to pay Xerox. In addition he is training our operators how to service the machines ourselves, which again saves money and is faster than waiting on a service technician to show up. As labor costs are over 50% of our maintenance costs from Xerox, we feel pretty comfortable that we can meet our goal of reducing the maintenance costs by 50% which eventually may allow us to lower the costs of our Bibles and books even more.
During the Spring of 2005, Hendrickson Publishers, Inc. of Lowell, MA was able to acquire a perpetual license to publish the Interlinear Bibles from the U.S. Courts. We fought this but apparently it is God's will that they have this perpetual license. However, you should know that the Interlinear Bible editions they are publishing have not been revised since 1985. The Hendrickson editions don't have the revisions that we made to the New Testament, which we completed in 2000, or other corrections we made to the 1985 edition, and they don't have the Hebrew & Greek lexicons that we have added to the New Interlinear Bibles that we have listed below.
At any rate, we now find ourselves at a crossroads and need to seek your help once again. Both of our Docutechs are down and in need of service. The estimate for repairs is four to five thousand dollars. The KJ3-Literal Translation Bible (2005 Revised Edition of the Literal Translation of the Bible) was in production at the time the Docutechs broke down. Additionally, we need additional paper to get the KJ3-Literal Translation printed and the new editions of the Interlinear Bibles. The cost for that paper is $7,500 to $10,000. Altogether we are needing to raise $12,500 to $15,000 within the next four to five days to get production back under way.
1. For those who are able, a donation would be appreciated. Rest assured that your donation will be used in furthering God's Word. To make a donation, Use one of the links above or below, and/or,
2. Purchase one of the volumes below at a 50% discount off the retail price for yourself and maybe another for a friend or family member, and
3. We need your prayers.
Thank you for taking the time to read this.
In His Service,
Jay Green, Jr.
Since my last update we have been very busy. We have printed and delivered the following books and Bibles:
We have printed and are awaiting delivery from the bindery
50 copies of Unholy
Hands Vol. II
That is another 3,780 volumes printed
Total volumes printed on the two Xerox Docutechs through this date is 15,534 books.
We have recieved an additional $5,353 in donations for a total donations received to date as $19,353. This is 51.6% of our original goal of $37,445.00.
Another donor suggested that we address the issue of what appears to be poor stewardship regarding the long delays in producing several of the book projects that we have undertaken. I will try to address each of these now.
Traditionally, we had to print a minimum of 1,000 copies of a book in order to produce it at a reasonable retail price. This is the case with Unholy Hands on the Bible, Volume III. We had hoped that Lightning Source, the outside print on demand printer that we began using in 2000 would be able to produce these works in smaller quantities, thereby reducing the amount of up-front capital that we would need to produce the book. Conventionally, 1,000 copies would cost about $7,000 to get this in print. Using print on demand, we could get this same book in print for about $500.00. Lightning Source advised us that they could produce satisfactory hardcover books using this technology. When we received out first hardback copies from them, they were not satisfactory. This meant that the previous promised delivery dates (made planning on using Lightning to produce) could not be met because the quality of the hard-cover books just wasn't there. Lightning kept improving their hard-cover quality but never to a point that we felt comfortable with.
We didn't have the $7,000 to produce the books conventionally and our presales weren't sufficient to produce the book conventionally. In the past, we issued purchase contracts to dear saints that allowed us to produce our book projects and then paid the Saints back as the balance of the inventory was sold. But with the recession, 9/11, and the Iraq war, our sales downturn didn't allow us to meet our obligations to these dear saints in a timely manner as our overhead costs for survival just didn't leave enough funds to meet those obligations. We decided in good consciousness that we couldn't use this method of financing when we couldn't meet our past obligations.
Now that we have our own in house print on demand operation, it is our plan to produce this title in house, and have it bound by our outside bindery. This means that we should be able to deliver Unholy Hands Volume III, no later than August 2005.
This has been a tough one. We originally estimated over $200,000 just for re-typesetting this title. Obviously, the $9,316.00 raised doesn't even come close to covering the costs of typesetting alone. The $9,316.00 raised includes the New Testament which we have delivered to our customers. This leaves $6,987.00 total available for the three Old Testament Volumes. Originally, my wife - Tina, Tracy, Jay Sr. and myself were typesetting this. Jay Sr. has developed severe arthritis in his hands which limits what he can do on the typesetting. We had to let Tracy go, my wife had to quit to care for four of our grandchildren, and I was kept busy running the day to day business operations. We kept thinking that the economy would pick up allowing us to hire the necessary people to allow us to again concentrate on the typesetting which is why we kept advancing the date. I guess I'm an optimist and apparently unrealistic in my projections on this title.
I have tried to refund the purchase price on this title to many who have purchased, but they don't want the refunds, they want the books.
Does this title need re-typeset? Absolutely. Do we have the funds necessary to get this done at this time? Absolutely not.
What is my answer, prayer and lots of it. It took us over seven years to complete the Interlinear Bible originally and God provided the funds. Many times during that period we were close to closing our doors. But he provided just enough to keep us going and eventually we were able to put out the first edition. WE REALLY NEED TO GET THIS REVISED EDITION DONE but we must wait until the Lord provides us the means to do so. It is not on our schedule but rather on His. Again if any of you desire refunds, just ask and we will return your funds on this title. In the meantime, pray that we might be given the answer and the means to get this project completed.
One bookstore customers purchased 300 copies of this title, the other 47 customers paid a total of $1,034.00 towards this title. The New Testament portion of this is being typeset by a volunteer out of Philadelphia. We estimate that she will complete the New Testament by November which means that hopefully this title will appear in December 2005. The first revised books of the Bible (The Gospels) will be included in the Interlinear One Volume Edition with lexicons appearing in August 2005.
Both of these have completed typesetting and the Lord willing, we will be printing these in house during August 2005. You WILL get delivery on these by August 2005.
That is the major projects that we have underway and unfinished. There are some other minor titles that we are reprinting and these should appear in the fall. If you have any other questions about any other titles, please e-mail us at sales@sgpbooks.com.
Both Allen and I are trying our best to update the websites in between our other duties. Keep checking back as we are making a serious attempt to keep the information current.
I guess that is all I have to report at this time. We need your prayers, your support and your continued donations. If you can help, now is the time.
In Christ,
Jay Green, Jr.
Remember, to make a credit card donation, click on the link below:
http://www.sgpbooks.com/donations.cfm