BlurbReviews 104

Blurb is actively promoted by Adobe Lightroom as a platform for creating and publishing books. In my experience, Adobe provides excellent customer support, with prompt and accessible responses to questions or issues. Unfortunately, my experience with Blurb has been quite different. They do not offer a direct contact number, and email responses can take several days, which is particularly problematic when working under tight deadlines. Given that Adobe endorses Blurb as a partner for their platform, it would be reasonable to expect Blurb to offer more timely and efficient customer service, especially when customers are paying premium prices for printed books. Blurb should prioritize improving their support services to better assist their users.

15€ of shipping for 11€ of product? And 12days to recive the magazine? Out of USA your services is very very bad

Recently made a first year photo album for my second son, and was all set to upload when I realized I didn't have something right about the format (wanted a lay flat option). Reached out to Blurb and then sent me prompt, friendly, personal, detailed instructions that answered my question to the letter. Wow! Additionally, after a horrible UPS experience, I expressed I was anxious about the fact they use UPS and was worried I'd be slapped with another hefty fee (which FYI, never pay - learn about "self clear" when it's coming to you internationally!) but no! Not with Blurb, and they assured me of this. YES, they're expensive but WOW when I received my book in the mail it was perfect. Exception quality, so wonderful packaged. You really feel like you've created an heirloom. This is my third album I've done with them - one for my wedding, and both my boys first years. I can't wait for my kids to flip through this newest one. Thank you, Blurb for being ones that still offer real customer service. Nope, totally not paid for this. I was just stunned by the vast difference between UPS and Blurb, and so grateful there are still businesses built on integrity.

I have created 10+ premium magazines through Blurb, both in the US and now in Canada and the quality is excellent. Magazine size and quality about the equivalent of Condé Nast Traveler.
I used the Book Wright software that Blurb offer for free, to create all magazines and I've found the layout and colours to be very accurate.
Their magazine product is also amazing value, a 120+ page magazine just costs CA$25 for a single magazine, the price per magazine drops when you order larger runs.
I've found the photo quality to be comparable to photo books that I previously printed with Apple (paper is lesser weight than a photo book, but quality still good), to the point I no longer make photo books, just magazines.

I've also produced a couple of trade books (plain paper that can be written on). Even though it's plain paper the photo quality is still great.

I was dismayed to find that Blurb cannot handle images with resolution greater than 75 MP.
When asked about this limitation their response was to Google image resizing. Half of my images exceed 75 MP. None of the apps I tried will resize the resolution. Cannot use the app at all.

I ordered 2 books last December, one with a PDF. I had no cause to open the PDF until recently and found that there was no text in the PDF. I begin my query as to why and could it be fixed.
Several E-Mails later, no resolution. Shame on me, I lost the order number. They can't seem to find my order using my name or the book title? Really?

I had hoped they would just fix the problem and send me a new PDF with the print included.

I chose an upgrade from the standard book paper for my softcover photo book, and used all the same images I had previously used with a slightly higher priced hardcover book of the same size at a print on demand book site which did NOT have a store option for selling. The book on the other site was easy to design, looked good, with no surprises... BUT the Blurb softcover book looks like a report in a folder, rather cheap and tacky looking! No blank front & back pages, and the paper quality is marginal.
The design software is not as easy to use as vista print, and I struggled with it. I did not find a simple way to standardize all the pages and fit my images consistently. Instead I ended up with different border widths throughout which looks terrible.
I will probably try elsewhere if I can't figure out how to apply a standard template to every page!

I would like to thank Blurb for their professional, organized and neat production and excellent customer service. Jessica proceeded with my request quickly and Melissa provided me with a smooth inspection of the minor technical issue. She was very knowledgeable and figured everything out quickly. The colour issue got fixed and I received my order faster than expected time and in excellent quality. Thanks Blurb team.

I've been using Blurb for nearly 10 years, producing Trade Books with photographs - I help elderly people write their memoirs. People always say what great quality the books are - and they were! However, I'm currently awaiting (late) my third re-print of over £500 worth of books as each batch has been in thick and fuzzy print, but with the occasional random perfect page! The email support system is very slow. What's happened to the print quality? One of my lovely authors is very elderly and on borrowed time and I just want a set of good quality books for him. Come on Blurb - help me out here!

Do not waste your time or money. By far, the worst quality photo book I have seen so far.
Outside Binder text is off center vertically and horizontally
Bubbling on the back page
Poor quality paper
Poor quality prints
Inconsistent spacing/ padding on all the borders are on each page, which should have been full bleed.
Duplicate photo

I received my two lay flat books from Blurb and they were incorrectly printed and most pages have bleed on them. I triple checked the bleed on my pdfs and they were fine. The bleed issue only seems to be on the left pages of a spread so it's definitely not me. It has been over 8 days since I've received them and nothing has been resolved. Any company that gladly accepts $1200. 00 for printing but doesn't even have a phone number for customer serviced should we reported to the BBB.

The site rejects my password, does not send re-set links and has made it impossible to place an order. I have tried for two days now with no success.

They used to be good. The quality of the images was never an issue. Now they consistently print images that are too dark or green for the entire book and are refusing to fix the problem saying that in their "opinion" it is within acceptable margins of error. What happened to customer satisfaction!? I would not use them again. Find another source for printing. This is a total dud! Don't waste your valuable time formatting a book and spending money with them!

Blurb used to be a good company, but now has poor customer service. There's no number, and it takes almost a week for someone to respond to you. I've been in communication with * regarding my complaint for almost two months now, and the problem still has not been resolved.

I had ordered a proof copy of my book, but Blurb did not include my apartment number. As a result, the book was returned. No refunds given nor discounts or replacement of the book. I've decided to use Lulu from now on. Better all around.

*Redacted by Admin

I ordered a book from Blurb in July 2022, to be delivered by 29 July 2022 for a gift. The book never showed, and they refuse to contact me back through their customer support and let me know what's going on. This is a scam company that stole $86.00 from me.
ID # *******

I spent 6 months creating a 120 page book of original photography, with text, using Blurb's BookWright system. I ordered a proof copy and it looked okay so I ordered 50 copies of my book at a cost of approximately $3,000.00. About 35 of the books have printing defects which look like black ink smudges on the white cover. I contacted customer service and they promptly responded, asking for photographs of the defective books. I sent the photos but unfortunately I never heard from customer service again even after sending several follow-up emails. I had no other choice but to contact my credit card company to file a dispute, I'm hoping they can help. Extremely upset and disappointed, not just with the poor quality of the printing but six months of hard work and almost $3,000 down the drain.

I ordered a book of my photos in hardback and a magazine version. The magazine version had been trimmed terribly. The outside edges of all the pages had debris from an obviously dull blade. How could quality control have missed something so obvious.
The shipping charges for Blurb and their subsidiary Magcloud are outrageous.
I will be looking for another self-publishing option.

I ordered my books with express shipping. Not only did it show up late, but they damaged almost all my books. They arrived in a cheap piece of cardboard (it would be an insult to call it a box) that was crushed, with no bubble wrap on the inside.

If you're thinking of using this company go somewhere else. All you'll receive is disappointment and damaged books.

I've been selling my books personally and through the help of Blurb manual ordering for my customers. So far so good until I found out they have been selling my book to the Global Retail Network when I had made a request to remove it since I wasn't familiar with the system yet.

Due to their neglect in handling this request, the book continued to be picked up by retail stores and Amazon, but I didn't get any royalties because the profit section has not been filled out. Again, I made the request to remove my book. The only blame I can put on myself is that I didn't check my Sales Overview whenever I'm logged in to my Blurb account, but to my knowledge they had agreed to remove it so I never touch that area. I had an instinct to check it, and lo and behold, my book has been selling for months, without a profit made to me. I made 80 sales and no notifications that this was happening. 80 sales from what I calculated would be around $1000.

I told them they shouldn't be approving books without a set profit. How is that any fair to the author? They must know that no author would just give their books for free. So now they earned from it, retailers earned from it, but the author didn't. A few back and forth e-mails later, all they can do is repeat to me the things I already know, and they couldn't even give me any sort of appeasement to the unclaimed profits.

They fully remove themselves from the situation when they know that their system allowed my book to go through without the Profit being filled, and that I had requested for it to be removed. Their system didn't alert any errors. So they put the full responsibility to the author.

Please see the exchange I had with them. Customer service is very cold especially Mary. The escalation to her didn't bring me any resolution, and I am now upset more than ever.

If you're going to sell with Blurb, make sure you set your profits because their system is not foolproof, and they don't care about what you earn or don't earn as long as they did.