What does it take to print more than half a million children’s books? Last week, we invited a few partners to see for themselves, in a behind-the-scenes visit to the printers Tandym Print.
As Book Dash celebrates our 10th anniversary, we’re currently printing a whopping 609,000 books across 11 South African languages. This will take the total number of Book Dash books in the world to well over 4 million. It’s our biggest print run yet, and we suspect it to be the largest-ever print run of children’s storybooks in South Africa. Importantly, it’s coming at a time when young children need books in their homes more than ever. The books are destined for 120 partner organisations across the country, to be distributed through programmes to children to keep and own. Funding comes from donor partners looking to improve systems for early development and literacy levels at scale.
Why is this such a big deal? Having books at home improves children’s early literacy skills, setting them up for success in all subjects. The book acts as a tool to support the parent-child relationship and for play-based learning. The earlier we start, the greater the gains so Book Dash advocates for book ownership from birth.
Yet in South Africa, two out of three homes with young children do not have a single children’s picture book, according to the 2023 National Reading Barometer. In the past, cost and availability have limited our ability to get all children owning books, but with Book Dash’s work to optimise for efficiencies in key publishing and distribution processes, that isn’t the case anymore.
Book Dash was born and designed with scale in mind. In 2014, its founders used their publishing expertise to change the landscape of access to books in homes, for all preschool children. During the tour of the printers, we shared how careful decision-making at each step of the publishing, printing and distribution processes makes it possible to drive down costs and get more books to children. The Book Dash model reduces the cost of producing quality, local children’s books by up to 80%. For this print run, the books are just R15. Did you know?
- We assess and print to the exact needs of our partners (in terms of languages and number of children). The bulk of the books go directly from printer to partner. This drastically limits wastage and reduces costs and energy used in packaging, warehousing and logistics.
- We assess and print to the exact needs of our partners (in terms of languages and number of children). The bulk of the books go directly from printer to partner. This drastically limits wastage and reduces costs and energy used in packaging, warehousing and logistics.
- Book Dash books are printed at a 15x15cm format. Not only do these fit perfectly into tiny hands, but this size suits commonly-available paper sizes and minimises paper waste.
- Printers overprint to insure against errors. In agreement with Book Dash, additional copies (called ‘overs’) are first offered to factory staff for their children. The rest are passed on to Book Dash to distribute. A run of this size could result in thousands of additional books into the hands of children.
- It takes five weeks of active production to pull off such a big printing job. Processes start with signed-off proofs and move to plate-making, printing, folding, stitching, trimming and packing per order. The team at Tandym Print is calling May “Book Dash month!”
As we kicked off the tour, we took a moment to reflect on the fact that there are around 1.2 million children born each year in South Africa. The current print run alone represents enough books to give half of the children born in 2024 a book of their own.
Even 4 million books isn’t yet enough to fix the unequal access to books for preschool children – but it’s a significant start and a real effort to build literacy from the ground up.
Now that we’ve developed a catalogue of 200 local titles, worked out the logistics of printing and distributing half a million books to children responsibly, and know the research supports this work, we’re ready to scale up to reach every child in South Africa.
Keen to join us in tackling literacy challenges? Want to add books for all children in your programmes? Give us a shout!
All Book Dash books are created and published to our website for free under a Creative Commons (CC BY 4.0) License). The open licence means that there is no restriction on what can be done with the books, not even a restriction on commercial use.
This means that anyone can download the files from our website and re-publish the books on their own website, or make animations from the books, or translate the books into any language. Anyone can even print thousands of copies and sell them. The only requirement we have is that the four creatives who made the book (author, illustrator, editor and designer) are always acknowledged, that there is a link back to the Book Dash website, and the Book Dash logo is also visible. Download our toolkit
Also, if the original format was changed, the nature of the adaptation needs to be stated. (e.g. translated, new illustrations, audiobook, etc). So as long Book Dash and the creatives are credited correctly and no one expects exclusivity of use, they can click through to the source files of each book from our website.
An example sentence of this could be:
“Originally published by Book Dash under a Creative Commons Licensed BY 4.0. This book can be read for free on (https://bookdash.org/) and was created by [author, illustrator, editor, and designer].
We know of more than 100+ organisations who do just this and you are welcome to watch the two recordings below to see different content partners across the globe showing how they use and/or adapt the Book Dash to work for their local contexts:
We adore seeing what happens to our stories once they are out in the world and we like to keep track of the cases where our books are re-used. If you think there’s room for collaboration between Book Dash and your organisation and/or project to heighten both of our reach and impact, feel free to let us know what you have in mind and how we can help by emailing team@bookdash.org.
Book Dash was nominated for the prestigious ALMA Award 2024.
This global award is given annually to a person or organisation for their outstanding contribution to children’s and young adult literature. It was established in 2002 by the Swedish government to promote every child’s right to great stories. With a prize of five million Swedish kronor, it is the largest award of its kind. Administrated by the Swedish Arts Council.
A total of 245 candidates from 68 countries have been nominated for the 2024 award, including 66 candidates new from previous years. The list include authors and illustrators, as well as storytellers and reading promoters with nominations submitted by organisations from all over the world.
The nomination underscores the impact of our work on the broader community and industry. It indicates that our efforts have not gone unnoticed and have resonated with audiences, peers, or stakeholders. The fact that our work has garnered attention speaks volumes about its influence and relevance. Even in instances where the award is not ultimately conferred, the nomination serves as a testament to the positive imprint our work has left on the field.
From time to time Book Dash organises a Collaborative Print Run, which is a pooled procurement project offering quality authentic children’s storybooks in different South African languages. As everyone’s small orders add up to a large enough volume of books, you help us achieve economies of scale, and very low prices for all.
We do this because giving books to young children to love and own has been shown to make a huge difference to the development of their literacy skills, their socio-emotional skills, their level of school-readiness, and their future in general. We always strive to make giving books as affordable as possible for you and your organisation.
We are offering a variety of Book Dash books (15cm x 15cm) at R15 per book to be delivered in the last quarter of 2023. These books will arrive in time to make excellent inclusions in holiday packs or be given to children as graduation gifts. Alternatively, you can also keep the books for an early start with your 2024 programmes.
Click on the button below for more information on how to order.
Book Dash is over the moon to share that there are now over 3 MILLION Book Dash books in the hands and homes of pre-school children in South Africa and around the world! 🌟 That’s right, beautiful, engaging, relevant books of their own to take home and own. Our creative volunteers, partner organisations and loyal donors are the heroes here. With just under six million pre-school children in South Africa, three million books? That’s big impact! 💪
📚 Owning books prompts children and adults to read together more often, building essential foundations in literacy and social skills. Children who enter school with better pre-literacy and social skills go on to perform better at school and have greater economic prospects.
📈 Of course, we only want to do more! We want every child to benefit from owning books. The Book Dash model and our network of creative superheroes mean we have the books to do it, and at a fraction of the cost it would have been otherwise. We hear from partners and donors that they see Book Dash books everywhere! But it’s not only about quantity — partners report that the quality of the books means that they’re making a huge difference to the children who receive them, the families and homes they go into and the quality of early education programmes across the country. Do you want to make a tangible impact on literacy? Email team@bookdash.org to find out how you can help get more books into children’s hands and homes… and more about why it matters.