How Gifts Grow Books

Why reader support—not scale or institutions—keeps this press alive.

People often ask how a small poetry press actually works. Not the romance of it but the economics. So I want to be transparent and simple about how Ink & Ribbon Press is built, and how it continues.

For each title we publish, we make two things in parallel:

• 250 limited-edition books, designed to be read, held, shared
• 3 hand-bound fine art editions, made slowly by hand as archival objects and gifts

Together, that costs just over $5,000 per book. Paper, printing, binding, design, shipping. Real materials. Real labor. No shortcuts.

We don’t take salaries. Every person involved at Ink & Ribbon volunteers their time. But we insist on paying bookmakers and craftspeople fairly because craft deserves wages.

Our goal is to publish four books per year. That’s $20,000 annually to keep the press producing, open, and committed to discovering new poets. We do have operational overhead, and we do pursue major gifts and grants but those are competitive, slow, and far from guaranteed.

Which brings me to the flywheel.

If the people who read this—poets, readers, supporters—choose to back the press through a paid subscription, the math becomes beautifully straightforward.

An $80 annual Substack subscription (or $8 per month) directly helps fund the making of new books. More poets published. More work brought into the world.

$80 a year is about $1.50 a week. Roughly twenty-two cents a day. Less than the cost of convenience. Enough, together, to create permanence.

This is why I often say I want Ink & Ribbon Press to be the press Substack built. Not backed by institutions. Not driven by scale. Simply sustained by readers who believe poetry still deserves to be made carefully, physically, and with intention.

There’s no expectation here. No pressure. Just an invitation.

If you’ve submitted work, read something that stayed with you, or believe that books should still be made with care—this is how gifts grow books.