Hello everyone,

I have a couple written works that I’d like to have published. I also have a long standing dream to create my own publishing house. At the beginning it would be just me publishing my own works, but eventually I’d like to make it into an indie publishing house. Also I might want to publish under different pen names and wanted all to be under the same Publisher.

Now, I’m only in the beginning stage, but want to prepare myself as best as possible. So I have some questions. As I said, I’m based in Germany, so if you know anything in that context please share!

• I’m assuming I need to register a business here to act under. Would it be a Kleinunternehmen? I heard people talking about Sole Proprietor or LLC, but LLC seems like overkill for me now. I have created Kleinunternehmen (small business) before as a freelancer, so I know a bit of the process, I’m just not sure it applies to publishing.
• I’ve heard about DBA, which is a term in the United States, what would be the equivalent in Germany?
• Once I have a business, will I be able to use its name as the Publisher? I don’t want “Amazon” to be the publisher of my books.
• What marks a book as published by my company? Is it the company name set when buying an ISBN? Or is it when publishing on KDP?

Thanks a lot and sorry for the very beginner questions.