Thanks for stopping by. We are here to guide you through the childrens book printing process.
It won’t be long before you experience that super exciting moment when a glorious stack of boxes arrives and you unpack the first book. Yes, your self-published book. Enjoy the feel and the smell of them…you worked hard for this moment.
At the heart of our process at is the Print Journey. Each of the 5 steps has its own hub where you can enjoy comprehensive guides, illustrated articles, captivating videos and insightful blog posts. These resources empower you to make well-informed decisions about design and styling, propelling your project from an initial idea to a bound children’s book.
We have compiled a packed, informative video to guide you through the entire process of printing a children’s book. Our hour-long guide takes you through the winning options illustrators (both independent and famous) have chosen when designing and styling their books to achieve eye-catching finishes and huge acclaim. We detail the options available for size, paper, binding and premium cover options.
The showcase section dissects a stunning range of previous books we have printed. In addition, there is a very special section where we look at iconic children’s books from famous authors going back as far as the 70s to show the tricks, layouts and styling they chose to become so successful.
This marketplace is super competitive so we want your book to be visually brilliant, to stand out against the crowd and to become every child’s favourite bedtime story book!
We have 45 years of experience with children’s books. They were all we used to read at school and now we print them.
We consider ourselves specialist children’s book, colouring book and educational book printers who will work with you to take your artwork from screen to a wide range of printed outcomes. Our video series will really expand your knowledge on the options available in print and our file set-up guides will make you a better designer.
It’s 2024 and it has never been easier to self-publish a book. Brilliantly, you don’t even need a publisher anymore. Jump on Kickstarter and start a crowdfunding campaign, tell the world about your great publication and become fully funded before you go to print.
Intriguingly, the scope of Children’s Books has evolved and increasingly we are seeing storybooks to promote a business or brand which can be sold in a gift shop, through an online store or at a trade show.
What an easy solution for repurposing your work. You have already spent the time creating some magnificent illustrations, so why not drop them into Illustrator, convert them to line art and within a few clicks, you’ve got a colouring book too! Two revenue streams and publications for the time it took you to design one 🙂
There are almost infinite possibilities on size, finishing and papers so we offer expert knowledge and advice before your job goes to press, a competitive book print quote to stretch your budget and a high quality standard of printing delivered nationally throughout the UK and worldwide too. The best thing to do is take a while to watch out video guide and look through our case study portfolio.
For smaller digestible chunks, enjoy: Winning Solutions for designing, styling and printing a children’s book. and Printing a colouring book from your illustrations.
Next up, send the print-ready pdf to Ex Why Zed. Do touch base with us a few months before and we can quote the job so you’ll know how many copies you can print for your budget. We will deliver the finished printing back to you in 4-10 working days (depending on print specs and run length).
We have been doing this a while now and have seen a lot of impressive publications come off our presses. To give you a head start with your children’s book printing, here are four print specifications which work well (and photos of them, see right). Each has its own characteristics which have proven to be winning combinations from a production perspective, cost per unit and most importantly, have reader appeal.
If any of our showcase options would work for your project, take a note of the spec and jump on our quote form to receive your bespoke quotation. Or ping us an email on hello@exwhyzed.com if that is easier.
Showcase 1 – a square, perfect bound solution with silk finish:
210x210mm Perfect Bound Books.
4pp Cover onto 300gsm Silk.
Matt Lamination to outer.
40pp Text onto 170gsm Silk.
Four colour print throughout.
As a guide, you could print 200 copies of this for £5.95 per book.
Showcase 2 – a stapled landscape option reminiscent of the Julia Donaldson series (best for longer, litho print runs):
210x272mm Landscape Wire Stitched Booklets.
4pp Cover onto 350gsm Ensocoat One Sided (1 side gloss, 1 side uncoated)
Gloss Lamination to outer.
32pp Text onto 170gsm Silk.
Full colour print throughout.
As a guide, you could print 5000 copies of this for 77p per copy.
Showcase 3 – an impressive, square hardbook version – the more you print, the lower the unit price will be :
210x210mm Case Bound Books.
Cover onto 170gsm Silk.
Wrapped over greyboard case.
Lamination to outer.
2x 4pp End Papers Printed onto 170gsm Silk.
52 inside pages onto 170gsm Silk.
Four colour print throughout.
Showcase 4 – a cost-effective, stapled landscape booklet ideal for low quantities:
A5 Landscape Booklets
4pp Cover onto 350gsm Silk
Matt Lamination to outer
24pp Text onto 170gsm Silk
Four colour print throughout
As a guide, you could print 400 copies of this for £1.30 per booklet.
Tweaks you could consider…
• Reducing the cover to 250gsm which also makes it easier to open.
• Switching to gloss lamination for a shiny aesthetic.
• Increase the size to A5 to save you money and make the publication more ergonomic.
• OR increase to A4 for a larger area of content.
• Increase the weight of the inside pages to 170gsm making it more substantial and impressive for the reader.
• Pick out some content on the cover for Spot UV varnishing or foiling to make it a premium book (this is an additional £280).
For more ideas on children’s book printing and to see examples of other similar books we have printed, do spend five minutes looking through our portfolio of case studies
I have been using Ex Why Zed for three years and they have printed over 40,000 children’s books for me. At every stage of the process they have been incredibly helpful, supportive and professional. The quality of the books is brilliant, the colours are vibrant and the overall look and feel of the books is exactly what I wanted. I cannot recommend Mike and the team enough – especially if you are a self-published author with limited knowledge of the printing process – they will guide and support you throughout the whole journey in bringing your book to life!
We have done our best to give you a huge wealth of information on this page and in our guides but if here are some frequently asked questions to help you get your work into print.
If you haven’t already seen it, do also watch our feature length Children’s Book Printing Guide which explains visually way better than we could here in word form.
We will aim to deliver short run digital jobs in 4/5 working days and longer, litho print runs in 6-10 depending on the complexity and quantity.
Additionally there can be a day or two of amends required to the artwork before it’s print ready which we’re more than happy to help with but you’ll need to factor that in to timings.
Remember, we’ll need a hi res pdf file with 3mm bleed and crop marks on each edge to go ahead please. Sending it over correctly first time means we can go straight to print. Do have a last check through our file set up guides to make sure all the boxes are ticked.
Our house papers come in a silk, gloss or uncoated finish.
For an example of a children’s book with a gloss cover, check out Pouch’s Magical Worry Cheeks. This also has gloss lamination to really make the cover jump off the shelf.
For a more subtle matt cover and silk finish, take a look at our case study of Nana Duck.
The numerous offsrping of Ex Why Zed staff love their board books so we know these well but at present they are not something we are able to produce. If you check the back cover of any of them, they are all currently printed in China.
As a cost and time saving alternative, we can print you a wire stitched, perfect bound (softback) or case bound (hardback) the children’s books.
Any portrait size upto A3 (420x297mm) and any landscape size as wide as A4 (210x297mm).
Wire stitching is a little bit of print jargon for ‘stapling’. To confuse things even more it can also be known as ‘saddle stitching’. Let’s stick with stapling though if that’s easier.
If you have an A5 zine then we print it onto A4 sheets, fold them in and put two staples along the left-hand edge to bind the sheets together.
The total number of pages needs to be a multiple of four to work as a stapled booklet.
To set-up artwork for wire stitching, visit our dedicated page.
The perfect bound method of binding will give your publication a square spine and professional looking finish.
For further advice follow our perfect binding set up guides.
Lamination is a thin film that we apply over the top of your printed cover to give it more longevity and to prevent scuffing and ink cracking. It only adds around £4 to the total cost but really helps your zines arrive looking in pristine condition.
Choose from matt, gloss or soft-touch.
Matt Lamination works best with silk and uncoated covers. This is a our recommended go-to lamination choice. However, we would suggest using gloss lamination if you are aiming for a super shiny, high impact cover.
Soft-touch has a velvet, illustrious feel but does attract finger marks REALLY quickly so best not eat your lunch before reading! In recent tests a soft-touch laminated zine ended up looking like we’d eaten a bacon sandwich off it within minutes – stick to matt or gloss instead.
We don’t, but you can go direct to https://www.nielsenisbnstore.com/ who are the UK supplier of ISBNs.
From there you can download the number and/or a barcode to add to your artwork.
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We like to interact with our customers, find out about their projects and have a bit of dialogue rather than hide behind a massive, confusing spreadsheet on a website.
We provide a bespoke quote for each and every job because your project is bespoke and unique.
Don’t get us wrong, our process is quick and efficient but we like to add extra value by starting a conversation with you first. Remember conversations? Yep, they are what happened before your phone was glued to your head! 🙂
For this reason we don’t list all our prices online but get in touch either in email or through our quote form and we will give you a bespoke quote.
Enjoy our recent blog post ‘10 Ideas to Promote Your Children’s Book on Social Media‘.
As the proud author of a new children’s book you have just printed at Ex Why Zed, you are now looking for ways to get the word out on social media. Well, you’ve come to the right place! Social media offers a great way to promote your book to the right audience and maximise its impact. Brilliantly, it is also FREE. You have done the hard work of writing the book, getting it illustrated and transforming it into print, now comes the fun bit of showing the world.
Yes, we did and here is our case study of Little Lost Luna.
