Scientology's massive publishing facility produces millions of products per week, which it says has 'sparked a renaissance of Scientology'

Scientology's Bridge Publications

Scientology's Bridge PublicationsAccording to the Church of Scientology, there is an unprecedented worldwide demand for the knowledge of Dianetics and Scientology. It is touting its state of the art Bridge Publications and New Era Publications printing operations, which it says are the world's largest all-digital, print-on-demand facilities (see promotional video below).

To bring the works of L. Ron Hubbard to the world, the church operates Bridge Publications in Los Angeles, a facility that is 270,000 square feet and covers an entire city block. The facility maintains a stock of 3500 miles of paper which it uses in its publishing ventures, and 20 tons of materials for the production of CDs.

Every component in the publishing stage is digitalized, which the church says allows it to publish 385,000 books every week, in numerous languages, with the push of a button. The system is used to publish 78,000 book covers per day that are overlayed with plastic laminate, making the books waterproof. The hardback books are processed in way so that they are durable for a lifetime. As to paperback books, 6,000 of them are bound per hour — or just over a million a week.

Bridge produces 1 million CD lectures per week, also in a variety of languages. The church says that it produces its written and digital material in 50 languages.

Scientology's automated publishing operations are designed to minimize staff needed to operate the presses.

The massive volume of product, consisting of 1.5 million books and 15 million CDs are stored in a 2.6 million cubic square foot warehouse and every title is accounted for in a central computer that automates fulfillment of product orders.

A similar operation, under the banner "New Era Publications," is located in Copenhagen, Denmark.

The church says that these operations have "sparked a renaissance of Scientology itself."


{video link}

D. Beeksma

One of the growing crowd of American "nones" herself, Deborah is a prolific writer who finds religion, spirituality and the impact of belief (and non-belief) on culture inspiring, fascinating and at times, disturbing. She hosts the God Discussion show and handles the site's technical work. Her education and background is in business, ecommerce and law.

More Posts - Website - Twitter

  • WakingUp

    This strikes me as being incredibly greedy and very materialistic. The saddest part to me is how the Sea Org (Scientology clergy) members you see there, in red shirts, are getting paid $50 a week, NO Healthcare, NO retirement and rarely get time off. No doubt they scrubbed, cleaned, and worked their butts off to get ready for this video. Yuck. If they are going to be factory workers, then they deserve the rights of factory workers!

  • Pebbles

    14 work days hou7vrs days for $25 to $50 a week with no workman's compensation, it where Sea Org member a 14 year old Daniel Maltivano lost a finger to one of those book presses. when He should have been in School.
    Its where they print those books for pennies and sell them for a tidy over inflated profit.
    Its PR hype targeted at the followers of Scientology.. they get bombarded with all kinds of drivel and phony lies, about how their expansion is unprecedented.
    when in fact Scientology is shrinking fast.

    Scientology will be hard pressed to find a buyer for an aging printing facility in the digital age. as far as the books Libraries outside of Clearwater refuse to accept them.

  • jeff

    "Waking up" and "Pebbles" comments are totally negative and ridiculous. Where did you two get those lies from? When I was in school I had to do research on subjects before I submitted them to the teacher. And I would never submitt any data that was false or made up! What is wrong with you two? Why didn't you ask a staff member what his or her life was instead of making it up? Have you read any of the Scientology books that you so nefariously comment on? I imagine not! You are both like a movie critigue who critiques negatively without seeing the movie–disgusting!

    • pebbles

      Daniel Maltivano loosing his finger Is from a Court documented legal case
      he was told to lie to avoid a Workmans comp claim
      Substandard Pay is documented in Several Legal Cases
      the under age workers are also Documented.

      the Scientology Movie Is a Horror Flick Jeff.

    • pebbles

      as far as the Miscvages Library Campaign goes ,it was a scam.and outside the bubble of Clearwater. those crappy Basic sets were rejected by most Libraries.
      those books are gathering dust in that printing facility Warehouse

    • Louanne

      First, let's see if I can read this. Debbie blocked me earlier in true application of her understanding Freedom of Speech.

      Second, I would comment here if there was something to talk about. Like "What is the Sea Organization"?

  • Ed-words

    Jeff, here's your chance to set the record
    straight.
    Refute what you deem misinformation point by point.

    • GUest

      He can't, he's just an OSA internet guy who came here to make specifically vague denials and sell Scientology. It's probably "Louanne" posting as "Jeff", she got busted doing that here a few months ago.

      • http://www.goddiscussion.com admin

        It's a different IP this time.

        • Louanne

          Jeff, stop trolling.

  • Tracy

    Scientologists are so out of touch. Why are they are so proud of this printing facility? As newspapers and magazines struggle to survive and books go to e readers they revel in their gigantic printing press. Come out from under your rock Scientology and join the 21st century. Oh and participate in the human race. Perhaps you'll research your bad self and realize that nobody likes you either.

  • http://dissemination.tel John

    I am a former staff of publishing company New Era Publications. And I have no knowledge whatsoever of "greed", so far I remember, all the money is used for dissemination, and staff is there to make it happen. It was the greatest time of my life and I was most productive when working there. And there is nothing better than knowing how it helps the people. Just before few days I found out one of my former friends, was helped to get rid of drugs, even before years, he was hostile to Scientology and was belittling it.

    Today, he and his friends, all non-Scientologists, are drug free, and THAT is what is the product of these books: improved and saved lives.

    I understand there is a lot of hostility against anything named "Scientology", but I also understand well that that comes out of lack of knowledge of what Scientology really is.

    Although Scientology is spiritual, we are not doing our work to judge anyone or to tell anyone what to believe. Under Code of Scientologists, we are bound to work for freedom of speech, to actively decry suppression of knowledge, wisdom, philosophy or data which could help mankind, and to support freedom of religion.

    That means also supporting freedom of non-religion, and not believing.

    Our main purpose is to help, regardless of who believes what. My friend did not read or believed in Scientology, but he and his non-Scientologists were helped. That is the purpose and that is what we do.

  • https://whyweprotest.net/anonymous-scientology/ Wally Hanks Raped Children

    The more I learn about Scientology, the more disgusted I get. How in the world can the police not shut them down. They must pay a lot of money out in bribes and payoffs to powerful people like Los Angles County Sheriff Lee Baca.

  • Pingback: Former Church of Scientology members report horror stories to Russia Today | God Discussion