Who Are We?

We publish books and materials to support higher education and scholarship, offering them to students at significantly lower cost than our competitors.  Our focus is on publishing ideas with an emphasis on the most current scholarly knowledge -- what will enlighten rather than mislead -- presented in a way that engages and encourages interest in the subject. We were delighted to be recognized for that work with the 2009 edition of Pearce's Organizational Behavior Real Research for Real Managers receipt of  the Academy of Management Practice Theme Committee's Award for Best Practice-Relevant Scholarship.

Students, libraries and teachers rightly decry the high cost of textbooks and educational materials. Melvin & Leigh, Publishers was founded in the belief that this situation is intolerable, and that we can do better. We seek to meet students’ need for affordable educational books by emphasizing content, not expensive packaging.

We are committed to publishing books with superior content that are priced at least one-third less than competitors’ textbooks.

How Can We Do That?

 We can produce books with superior content by attracting authors who believe in our mission, who have a demonstrated ability to produce the best work in an engaging manner, and who are willing to work with us to identify the instructors who would be interested in assigning their book in courses.  We believe such superior authors deserve superior royalties and we are committed to providing royalties at least equal than the royalties provided by our competitors.  We are a publisher by and for educators and students.

 We keep our costs lower than the large textbook publishers in several ways:

 Our marketing is based on delivering complementary desk copies of our books to those who teach the courses for which our publications are intended, rather than relying on a sales force that calls on instructors in their offices.  In this way we directly put our books and materials into the hands of educators without the expense of sales force salaries, benefits and travel costs.

• We rely on state-of-the-art technology to prepare materials drawing on our network of production and design professionals, reducing fixed costs.

• Our emphasis is on subject matter content, written a readable and engaging way.  We do not seek to distract from dry, disconnected bullet-point lists of topics with expensive cartoons, newspaper clippings and lots of color on the page.  Our books are for college courses, and we are confident that these students prefer printed text that is engaging and informative, rather than paying for costly efforts to make the material look like a children’s picture book.

Students interested in learning about our books can click here for more information.

Prospective authors who want to explore joining us in bringing better quality and more affordable textbooks to students should write to our Editorial Director, H. Melvin at editorial@melvinleigh.com.