We help your business grow: Could a book be worth $400?

Tuesday, September 6, 2016

Could a book be worth $400?

Some people collect old cars or trade baseball cards. I'm more interested in holding something I have a real connection with, something with ideas that have changed me.

I've written in the past about luxury goods and the value of physical artifacts in a digital world.

A book is a special object, a time-tested conveyor of not just information, but emotion and connection. Some of my best friends are books.

This summer, I put together a worldwide team to create a book that might be worth owning, saving and sharing. The goal was to create a substantial (okay, huge) and beautiful book that would be scarce, valuable and worth it.

We sent the files to the printer last week, and I couldn't be more excited about what we've created. You can see some sample pages and read about the history of the project here. It's absolutely the most beautiful thing I've ever been privileged to put my name on. It weighs more than 15 hardcover books and is 800 pages long.

All the words are already online for free (it's a collection of my online writing over the last four years). What you can't get online, though, is the feeling of owning it and the joy of gifting it.

A few thousand people pre-ordered their reserved copy last week, and now we're opening a window for pre-ship orders. As I write this there are fewer than 2,400 copies available for sale between now and September 9th. There will be one more window at a higher price for any remaining copies in November when the books begin to ship.

There's only one printing, and when the book is gone, that's all there is.

The book doesn't actually cost $400 or even half that, but the shipping fees to some countries are ridiculous. We worked hard to create something inspiring and timeless, and we're doing our best to get it to the few people who would like to be part of this journey.

I hope you'll take a moment to check it out here. Thanks for making it possible.