Sorry to bother the fine people here but I got some questions about fulfillment. This is a question for those who have experience with sourcing product in China to distribute through fulfillment centers.

I'm about to run a kickstarter campaign for books. If I make less than 500 book sales, I'm going to go Print On Demand. It makes more sense to go with an off-set print run in China if I make 500 or more sales: POD costs alsmost $19, but printing in China costs $3-5. Estimated cost to ship to US fulfillment center like FBA is $3000, or $3 per book.

If I use FBA, I assume I would use Multichannel FBA for this?

And I would send some to a European center and some to an American center, right?

According to this, I would be charged a total of 5.95 per book (assuming between 1 to 2 pounds) to handle AND ship within the USA... is that correct? Or is that just for handling?

Now, on the other hand, it seems that there are fullfillment companies in China that can drop ship, which would save me the cost of shipping to Amazon's (or other fullfillment house's) center. Why would I ship books to Amazon's multiple centers fulfillment provider in America or Europe when I can save that expense and have it drop shipped from China? Is there a customs-issue with sending books from China, drop ship?