There's no one answer to this, Astorian, everyone has different levels of free time, tolerance for "sleeves up" work and available cash. But that's a good thing, because each service, each "element" of a traditional label's service, from CD replication/duplication to posters to booking to digital distribution, has become available from many different sources.
So you can DIY the things you want, and work with services for others. Best of all worlds indeed.
--Peter
peter@tunecore.com