New Paul Mauser Archive overview video - the material behind the books...

Ever wonder why gun collector books cost so much?

When these books are published, and especially when they are historically accurate, well researched, deeply illustrated and then printed and published in color, in large format and on quality paper, they are expensive to produce.

The total market for people interested in purchasing these books is relatively small, and quite specialized. If you misjudge the potential market you'll either miss quite a bit of revenue, or be stuck with a large volume of books for years after publication. The total market for these very focused firearms collector books is perhaps 1,000 to 5,000 copies. Mass market books are often published with first printings in the 100,000 range or more.

Color printing in high quality can now be done in these small quantities at a reasonable price in Asia and at some competitive printing plants in Europe.

Not counting the time it takes to do the research, write the book, layout the pages, edit the content and work with a publisher / printer / shipper / warehouse the individual packaged and shipped copies cost a significant portion of the final retail price. There is not much left to compensate anyone else, so these efforts are mainly done for the good of the collecting community, and not for much profit.

Thankfully, the content of recently published books has contributed to better understanding of factual history and supports our collecting community.

The price of admission of these books looks outrageous to someone that is used to buying mass market books at remainders prices. When these books go out of print, they often end up selling for many times their original distributor price.

The other way to look at them is that they are tuition and the textbooks you need to master in order to graduate from "Gun Collector University"... The knowledge always ends up saving you more than you paid for the book the first time they help you avoid a buying mistake.

It's important to understand why some of these newer collector books are important. As the years have passed, more and more archival material and historic original documentation has become available. This material, when properly authenticated and curated, helps answer many of the questions collectors have as they look with increasing detail into the origin, production, and experience with various firearms. The books can help change speculation like "I think" into "I know"...

Here's a new video I just put together to discuss the archive behind the book I recently edited for the Paul Mauser Archive and it's curator:

[URL="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGHuEmQ5xG4"]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGHuEmQ5xG4

Paul Mauser Archive