what is Outlier Press?

This year I made a publishing imprint.

While my first book Fringes was a slightly scrappy shot in the dark, the same route to publication was more cumbersome for my second book Our Race, not least because there were 6 of us involved. Doing some research into the logistics led me to the possibility of starting my own imprint.

Once I found out that forming a publishing imprint was necessary for me to give Our Race the platform it deserved, I realised that it was exactly what I wanted to do.

Here's a bit about the Outlier Press and why it exists.

what is Outlier Press?

Outlier Press is a book publishing imprint. It exists for me to coauthor stories with standout individuals.

My first book Fringes was an unusual story, from an unusual perspective, told and published in an unusual way. Outlier Press will tell similar stories, starting with other athletes.

why does it exist?

I'd always wanted to write a book. I got going and while the self-publishing route had appealed to me from the beginning, I felt it would be silly to not check out the alternative. After a few 'no thanks' I pressed on with my original plan.

The result was a bestselling, award-nominated book, created in under a year.

My next project came as a result of this success. 4 Olympic gold medal winning GB athletes who wanted to do what I had done. Outlier Press was formed to make this possible.

but technically what does it do?

Most importantly, Outlier Press grants ownership and flexibility with the work.

A traditional publisher would keep about 90% of the revenue and have a controlling claim in any other projects that result from a book. We co-write and co-own the content and have much more autonomy with what we do with it moving forward.

A publishing entity is necessary to purchase ISBNs. An ISBN or International Standard Book Number is a unique product identifier for books and related material. It's not a legal requirement for a book to have an ISBN but having one expands the selling possibilities for the book. With Outlier Press, we can go as broad or as narrow as we like.

Having the imprint and ISBNs also makes tracking and then dividing the revenue from a project simpler.

This article from The Creative Penn was really instructive with the technicalities of setting up the imprint.

what does Outlier Press not do?

I won't be publishing other people's work. The press will only publish my work or work I co-create. It's not a service and the work it produces requires genuine buy-in from all parties.

It also doesn't preclude me from publishing my work elsewhere. I'm definitely interested in working with a traditional publisher and my Our Race coauthor Trystan and I are working on another project which we'll definitely pitch to publishers. I'd also happily ghostwrite elsewhere.

What I advised someone else was that traditional publishers want to see a big chunk of any potential book or a very detailed proposal and either of these things will need to be 50-100 pages long. If you've done that much work and believe in what you're doing, you might as well carry on and finish it, even if a publisher doesn't see value in it. Like Fringes, it might just be that they're wrong.

what's the first project?

Our Race is the first release from Outlier Press. The GB Men's 4x100m Relay Team won gold at Athens 2004, beating the heavily favoured USA quartet and shocking the world in the process. The guys came to me for advice on self-publishing after having no luck with the traditional route and we've ended up working together to make Our Race. Early reviews are great and we're all very proud of what we've made.

Outlier Press is also now the publisher of my first book Fringes. The first edition was well-received but was a bit scrappy. I've cleaned things up, had it properly proofread and now it's ready to be released more broadly than Amazon. I've also got the audiobook ready for release.

what's next?

For now, publicising Our Race and bringing Fringes to a wider audience. I'm developing other projects and am on the lookout for new stories to tell.

Writing my book was one of the best things I've ever done. If you're an unusual person with an unusual tale to tell, who wants to move fast, be unconventional and own your own story then let me know here. It might be one of the best things you do too.