Serving the
Western U.S.
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Since 1988
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Advice Columns
1. Planning Your Next Printing Job
2. Prepress
3. Offset Sheetfeed & Web Printing
4. Other Printing Methods
5. Bindery
6. Printed Packaging
7. Working with Printers
8. Trade Customs
 1. Planning Your Next Printing Job:
Whether you are a customer of a printer, a graphic arts professional or both, planning even the most simplest printing job requires many decisions. Complex projects may demand hundreds. Each decision affects all the others in the sequence from concept to finished product. Careful planning helps you control the quality, schedule and cost of printing jobs. Planning leads to a vision of the final product and results in clear communication among people involved in products. Decisions about printing jobs involve both business and technical information.
The main goal in purchasing printing is to get it done at the quality level you want and within your budget and schedule. The following is a general outline to follow when preparing your next printing project:
What is your purpose? You may want to use your printed piece to entertain, inform, impress clients, sell products, record keeping, or gain customers. For example, a marketing piece to impress clients may involve more time and money in creation and design than a sales flyer advertising a certain sales promotion for the week.
Who is your Audience? Will you be printing this job for seniors, children, business owners, purchasing agents or the general public?
What text and graphics will your piece contain and how will your piece look? Do you have a visual idea of your final piece. Is there a logo or certain style you want to maintain. If it’s a booklet, you may have in mind a size and approximate page count. Knowing your goals, audience and budget shapes your vision. Your concept of yourself or your business also affects design. Answering questions such as these helps stimulate the creative processes of writing and designing. The answers also influence decisions about ink colors, papers and printing quality.
How will readers use your printed product? Readers sort quickly through newsletters and direct mailings, more slowly through brochures and catalogs. A children’s booklet may need a laminated cover to protect it from dirty fingers and mishandling. A custom box used for tradeshows may also need to be strong enough to ship products in.
How will other businesses work with your product? Instruction booklets may need to fit into a box from another business. Labels must fit bottles. Show a dummy to people who will handle your piece to verify that it meets their needs.
How will your piece reach your audience? Perhaps the flyer goes into an envelope with a business card and reply envelope. If so, you may need matching papers and coordinated sizes. Some products need special packaging. Cd’s may need a CD jewel case or album, booklets with spiral and wire-o bindings needs to be alternated within boxes. Consider box weight and size. Materials for common carriers and mailing must conform to requirements for size, shape, weight, folds, colors and seals.
When do you need the job delivered? A printer’s ability to deliver on schedule depends on many factors. You control some of them: reading proofs promptly; keeping alterations to a minimum; and handling payments as agreed. Printers control other factors: scheduling jobs through departments or service bureau or subcontractors and ordering paper, inks and other supplies. Sometimes fate steps in: Weather conditions may affect paper delivery, a press may need immediate attention, a proof shows an error that a press operator catches and the job is held for review.
How many pieces do you needs? If you order too little, you pay for reprinting sooner than necessary. Because of additional setup charges, going to press a second time makes unit costs higher than printing all you need in one run. Also, unit price goes down and quantity goes up, so one large order costs less per piece than several small orders. For example, 5,000 color brochures may cost $0.26 each. Printing 2,000 color brochures may cost $0.45 each. Once you know how many you want, make it clear to your printer. Remember; most printers follow the trade custom allowing 10% over or under production. Since there is waste during setup and bindery, the printer usually will print extra. If you must have a certain number of pieces and cannot afford to have unders make sure your printer is aware of this at the time of ordering.
What quality do you need? Because the range of quality among printed pieces and printers is so great, planning requires decisions about how good the product must be. There are generally four categories of quality:
Basic Printing: Basic quality involves standard materials and quality control at quick printers. It gets the job done reasonably well. Basic quality pieces are usually in flat ink colors only, not four-color process. It includes political flyers, business forms and newsletters are usually printed basic quality.
Good Printing: Good quality printing involves standard materials and quality control at commercial and publications printers. Colors are strong, registration is tight but not perfect. It includes average direct-mail catalogs, most books and manuals, magazines and retail packaging.
Premium Printing: Premium quality requires careful attention to detail and high-grade materials. Color photographs seem to match transparencies and appear very sharp. Products have few flaws and seem almost perfect to people who are not graphic arts professionals. Many commercial printers do premium printing when schedules and budgets permit. It includes upscale clothing catalogs, most annual reports, high end magazines.
Showcase Printing: Showcase quality printing combines the best machines and materials, and operators who give scrupulous attention to detail. Everything from design to paper is first class. The category of showcase printing consists of products which themselves are forms of art that only a few printing buyers can afford or printers can achieve. It includes museum-grade art books, brochures advertising very expensive automobiles.
Quantity needs, costs and deadlines, as well as quality requirements, affect which printers are right for your job. Remember; when planning your printing job the cheapest price is not always best. Look for a printer or printing broker who can meet all your requirements.
Types of Printers:
Printers: Most graphic arts specialties, such as design and illustration, were once handled exclusively by printers. Many printers still offer these services in addition to printing. Printers who offer in-house design can often produce the entire job, starting with your rough copy and thumbnail sketch. Some printers subcontract certain steps in the production sequence. They may rely on other businesses for separations and bindery work. They may even subcontract print itself instead of working overtime or running a job on an in-effeceint press. Dealing with a quick printer means working with customer service staff “over the counter.” Dealing with a commercial or specialty printer means working with a sales representative.
Printing Brokers: Printing brokers coordinate printing jobs at many different printers. Brokers shop for printing just as you would if you had the time, skill and network of contacts. They may deal with trade printers who do not have sales reps and specialty printers located at great distances. They often get discounts based on high volume. As a result, brokers may get jobs done faster and for less money than you could. If your department or organization spends at least $30,000 per year on printing, you may find that working with a broker saves you time and money. A broker probably has worked in the printing industry in a wide variety of positions and companies. For that reason, you can use a broker to handle all your printing needs. To accomplish the same objective through sales reps, you might work with six or eight printers.
Advertising agencies: An ad agency builds an overall plan that may range from corporate logos to television commercials, then carries out the plan by contracting with media and producing messages. Clients hiring an agency may assume the campaign will involve some printed products but may have no specific ideas in mind. Not all ad agencies deal knowledgeably with printing. Some specialize in broadcast media and others in public relations. If you have printed pieces in mind as part of your ad campaign, make sure that the agency you are considering has experienced printing buyers.
Graphic Designers: Graphic designers build on ideas from customers to create printed messages. Designers subcontract for services and pass the charges on to clients along with a markup. Often, however, designers top short of contracting for the printing itself. Few design studios have sufficient cash flow to broker major printing jobs.; most prefer to have the customer contract directly with the printer.
2. Prepress:
Prepress is the term that is used in printing than means the work to be done on a job before it goes on the printing press. As discussed in the previous section, there are many decisions to make when preparing your job for printing. That is the same with prepress. With the availability of the computer and design software, many people have taken on the task of designing their own jobs. For some, this is a rewarding experience, for many, it turns into a disaster costing them money and time. Some printing jobs like newsletters, letterhead, and postcards may be easily handled by one with little experience in design, but a catalog, custom box or brochure should be designed by someone with experience.
Printers generally use a specific format and software to output film for your job. The film is used by the printer to make a plate for the printing press. There are many programs that are not compatible with film output devices. Contact your printer or service bureau before you begin. If you have the right equipment and software you can begin designing your job.
Fonts:
The next step is to select the fonts that you would like to use. You may be tempted to use many sizes, styles and different fonts. Resist that temptation. Stick with type that works for your designs. Using familiar type cuts costs and helps you meet deadlines. Use Type 1 or Postscript fonts. True type fonts will have to be converted or replaced by the service bureau which may cause delays and extra expense. A common mistake is selecting a Font attribute from the control palette instead of selecting the actual font from the font menu. Remember to always include the fonts you used on the disk you give your printer or service bureau.
Photos & Illustrations:
With the availability of photo Cd’s, digital cameras and royalty free internet sites there is a large section of images and illustration that can be used for your project. These images will need to be set up for use in printing. If you are designing a color flyer, make sure the image is set at CMYK and preferably at 300 dpi. Remember: if your original image is at a low dpi, you cannot increase the dpi to produce a better image.
Color:
Adding color to a printing job makes it more complicated and expensive. Printers have two ways of reproducing color. Flat color or spot color requires blending different inks into one ink with the required hue. It is like blending paints for household use. Flat colors are also referred to as PMS colors (pantone matching system). The second way to create a color involves using four hues called process colors. Dot patterns of the four process colors simulate the desired hue. The process colors are cyan, magenta, yellow and black and are abbreviated CMYK. Printers use four-color process to reproduce color photos and illustrations.
After the project is designed, you will need to give your printer the disk or film. If the printer has the film output from your disk make sure you proof it before it goes on the press. If you go to a service bureau and have film output, request a proof if flat color or a matchprint if four-color. The matchprint is a color proof directly from the film. The matchprint will be used by the printer to match the colors to the printed piece. This will also give you a chance to review your project before it goes to press.
3. Offset Sheetfed & Web Printing
In this section we will discuss the difference between an sheetfed press and a web press and want printing projects suits each press best.
Knowing how offset presses work means you can plan jobs to take full advantage of different machines and avoid expensive problems. Printing presses vary greatly in the types, sizes and abilities. Offset presses transfer images from an inked plate to a rubber blanket. It’s the blanket, not the plate, that comes in contact with the paper and actually prints the image. The image offsets from the plate to blanket, then offsets again from blanket to paper that is where the term offset printing comes from.
When to use sheetfed printing: Most printing projects under 20,000 pieces and over 70# weight of paper will be run on an sheetfed press.
Sheetfed printing is the most popular commercial printing method because printers using it produce quality results relatively quickly and inexpensively. Sheetfed printing is when each sheet is individually passed through the press. Web printing is when a continuous roll of paper is fed through the press then cut to the correct size. Web presses can often fold and bind in sequence with printing. In-line finishing saves time and money because of efficient manufacturing. Materials move quickly through the printing process Web presses can also print relatively light stock. Paper less than 50# tends to wrinkle passing though a press as sheets. Because they keep the paper under tension, webs commonly print 40# and even 30# paper.
Sheetfed and web presses perform equally well for basic, good and premium printing. Only a few of the most sophisticated web presses, however, are capable of showcase quality. You make the most important decisions about quality when you plan jobs and select printers. You signify to printers what quality you want by the appearance of specifications sheets, layouts an mechanicals; by how precisely you identify features you consider critical to success ;and by how expertly you examine samples and proofs. Printers use these signs to decide how much quality you recognize and demand. Many printers refer to a job in terms of the effort they believe it requires. Some jobs are routine; others call for the shop’s best effort.
4. Other Printing Methods
Some printers using nonoffset methods specialize in printing particular products such as labels, clothing, magazines or boxes. You can buy these products through an offset printer but usually at a substantial markup. Going directly to a specialty printer or broker saves money and speeds production. You may discover that some of these printing methods are available only from trade printers, meaning that they limit their business to other graphic arts professionals.
Flexography: Printing on substrates that don’t work well in offset presses calls for flexography, The process uses rubber or plastic plates on a web press. Water-based inks dry almost instantly, allowing fast running speeds. Flexo is popular for labeling and packaging because offset cannot print well on nonporous or very thick substrates. Presses printing flexography run rolls of plastic for products such as bread wrappers and may print one thousand feet per minute. Highly absorbent kraft paper for grocery bags can run even faster. Flexography doesn’t five the solid ink coverage or fine screen rulings of offset, so colors may seem weak and images washed-out. To locate flexographic printers, look in classified directories under “Packaging” and under products such as boxes, labels and bags.
Screen: Screen printing is the simplest of all printing processes. A printer needs only a screen stencil, ink and squeegee. The screen fabric is wire or polyester. Ink forced through the screen prints in the stencil’s pattern. Printers use the screen method for products such as T-shirts, signs and bottles. Most products are printed after manufacture. Ringer binders, for example, don’t go through an offset press, but can easily be screen printed. Commercial screen printing may be done by hand using only simple equipment or on automatic presses of varying size and complexity. Screen printers have their own classification in most directories. they may also listed under outdoor advertising, t-shirt, loose-leaf binders.
Gravure: Gravure plate cylinders carry images consisting of millions of tiny cells filled with ink. The cells vary in depth and width, so some hold more ink than others. Mounted on web presses, the cylinders transfer ink directly to paper. Presses have no blankets. Printers use the gravure method for long runs (millions) of magazines and catalogs. Gravure presses are huge, running rolls anywhere from 70 inches to 118 inches wide. Many gravure printers advertise in trade journals aimed at printing buyers for catalogs and national magazines and are known to printing buyers at companies that mail millions of consumer catalogs.
Engraving: Engraving involved images cut (engraved) into thick metal plates. Engraving remains the method for making prestige announcements, invitations and stationery. Engraving yields the sharpest image of any printing method and so is used to print currency and stock certificates with delicate details. Shading is produced using crosshatching, not halftone dots. Images for engraving are cut into the metal . The surface of the plate is covered with ink, then wiped clean, leaving the recessed engravings full of ink. The press then forces paper into the inked recesses, transferring the image to the surface of the paper. Engraving takes special presses and techniques and costs more than offset.
Thermography: Also known as raised printing, thermography costs less than engraving, can be produced more quickly and, to the untrained consumer, looks and feels similar. Thermography is a four-stage process that begins with printed sheets with slow-drying ink. The sheets exit the press onto a conveyor belt then they are sprayed with a fine resin powder. Powder sticks to the wet ink. A vacuum unit collects all powder not adhering to the ink. A heating unit then melts the remaining powder into the ink. The powder swells as it melts, so the printing rises above the surface of the paper. Although thermography powder takes on the color of underlying ink, it may not match perfectly. Thermographed images may scratch and doesn’t hold up to heat well, such as from laser printers. Thermography is used mainly for business cards, invitations and letterheads, but can also be used for booklets, directories and small flyers and posters.
Letterpress: Letterpress is a form of relief printing, meaning that characters on the plate are higher than the material surrounding them. Rubber stamps work on the same principle. Type printed on a letterpress may feel indented because of the direct contact between type surface and paper. Although printing is rarely done using a letterpress, the machine is used extensively for die-cutting, embossing and foil stamping.
Die-cutting: Letterpresses can cut paper using thin metal strips embedded in wood. The dies are pressed into the paper to cut the desired shape just a a cookie cutter produces shapes form dough. Die-cutting can make irregular shapes such as pocket flaps on presentation folders and large holes such as in door hangers.
Embossing and Debossing: Embossing and debossing take printing into a third dimension: depth. Paper is pressed between two molds, called a die, that sculpt its fibers by as much as 1/8 inch. Printers use the process for stationery, presentation folders, and covers for books and annual reports.
Foil Stamping: In foil stamping, hot dies with raised images press a thin plastic film carrying colored pigments against the paper. The pigments transfer from backing film to paper, bonding under heat and pressure. Printers use the process for presentation folders and covers for books and annual reports Any products that can stand up under heat and pressure can be foil stamped. Foil stamping is done on letterpresses. The size of the foil image is limited only by the size of the roll of foil and the intense pressure required to transfer the image. Foil stretches, so foil stamping mixes well with embossing for dramatic results. The process is called foil embossing. Successful foil embossing demands the right blend of paper, design and printer. Get advice and samples before going ahead.
These other printing methods are all options to dress up products. Many trade binderies do a variety of these services. Because these services are so often coupled with offset printing, they are frequently subcontracted by the printer. In many cases, it’s easier and may not cost any more simply to let the offset printer or broker buy out the additional work especially if you are not familiar with these services.
5. Bindery
After printing, most jobs require more work to convert them into the final product.. Large sheets may need cutting into individual pieces or folding to become parts of books. Printed sheets may need drilling, punching, stitching, or some combination of a dozen possible ending steps. Bindery operations take place in binderies that are either departments of a print shop or separate businesses. Binderies may have only a few machines in a back room or be multi-million dollar plants. Large trade binderies serve printers throughout their region. Machines that perform bindery operations are the least accurate of graphic arts equipment. Even an average press can register to 1/100 inch. In contrast, folding, trimming and binding are seldom done to tolerances greater than 1/32 inch. Good design includes a clear understanding of what happens to the job in the bindery.
Cutting & Trimming: Most press runs use paper slightly larger than the finished piece or print several items on one large sheet. Waste must be cut away and items cut apart for each other. The printer usually prints extra sheets to allow for bindery setup and adjustments. Cutters all work on the same principle: With the paper held tightly under pressure to assure an even cut, a guillotine blade slices down and across, cutting anywhere from one sheet to a stack three inches thick. A poor cutting job may have sheets that are out of square, ragged edges or uneven stacks. Some movement in stacks can be tolerated, but should be kept to a minimum.
Drilling & Punching: Drilling holes for ring or post binding is as common and easy as trimming and almost as easy to specify. Hole diameters between 1/8 and 1/2 inch are commonly available. State what size holes you want an dhow far they should be from each other and the edge of the paper. Better yet, give your printer an example of the binder the sheets must fit.
Scoring and Perforating: Scoring means to crease a printed piece so that it folds more easily. Scoring is done by equipment that presses paper against the metal edge of either a rule or a wheel. Perforating is simply punching a line of holes to make tearing easier. Most bindery machines can perforate in only one direction and only in a straight line. Scoring and perforating can each be done on offset and letterpresses as well as specialized bindery equipment.
Folding: The number of ways paper can fold seems endless. Most printers have equipment to make common folds using sheets as large as their largest press. Trade binderies typically have machines with six or eight folding stations to accommodate complicated work. Folding is not precise. Plan your design to allow for tiny variations in folds just as you would for variations in trims.
Collating: Even for a printer or bindery, hand collating sometimes works best for small jobs. Collating can be done automatically by equipment that holds stacks of sheets in pockets, then presents one sheet from each pocket for assembly. Machines have highly specific tolerances and capabilities. Signatures for publications must be collated so that, after they are trimmed, pages are in proper sequence. Nested signatures go inside of each other for saddle stitching. Gathered signatures go on top of each other for binding with square spines.
Common Bindings: There are several ways to attach loose sheets, folded sheets or signatures to each other:
Padding: almost every printer can make pads from stacks of loos sheets. For most printers it’s a hand operation with brush and glue pot.
Gluing: Binderies and envelope makers can apply adhesives in strips for individual sealing by the user.
Tipping: When one sheet is glued to another sheet or signature, it’s referred to as tipping.
Sealing: Often binderies have machines for sealing folded items ready to mail.
Tinning: Tinning refers to clamping metal strips along the tops or bottoms of calendars. Binderies that have them are hard to find. Begin by asking your printer.
Stitching: Stitch bindings are done with wire staples either through the crease of the spine or near one edge of the sheets. Most magazines are saddle stitched, meaning the staples go through the crease of the spine.
Paste Binding: Booklets with just a few pages of paper can be paste bound. With paste binding, a web press or folder lays thin strips of glue along fold lines. When the sheet is folded, glued creases meet glued folds to form the bond. After trimming, glue along the creased spine is the only binding.
Mechanical binding: Cookbooks and technical manuals that lie fat when open can be bound with plastic or wire shaped into either a spiral or comb. Mechanical bindings cost more per unit than other binding methods. Most print and copy shop have equipment for mechanical binding.
Perfect Binding: Perfect-bound books are made from gathered signatures. The left side of the stack, the spine, is trimmed to get rid of the folds and expose the edge of each page. The stack is then roughened and notched along the spine to assure maximum surface for glue adhesion. The familiar paperback book is perfect bound so are many magazines, such as Reader’s Digest.
Case Binding: Nothing beats case binding for durability, good looks or high cost. Case binding begins with sewing signatures along the spine. Thread makes a stronger and more elegant adhesive than glue. After signatures are sewn, they are gathered and trimmed on three sides. the stack is put inside a case made of binders board covered with paper, cloth, plastic or leather. The case is held to the signatures by glue along the spine and between end sheets. Printers and trade binderies who specialize in books customarily offer case binding.
6. Printed Packaging:
Whether you sell software, candy or music almost all products will need to be packaged. The packaging categories I will be discussing in this article are: Boxes, plastic & vacuum formed album for CD’s, Videos, Cassettes and Bags.
Boxes: Boxes can be used for several purposes. When most people think of boxes they think of plain brown corrugated boxes. These boxes are generally used for shipping merchandise from one location to another. Some companies take advantage of advertising their company by included a logo or image on the box. Printing on boxes can be done very inexpensively through single color printing during the manufacturing of the box or by silk screening on pre-made boxes. There are other ways to advertise your business through corrugated boxes. Litho labels can be printed and glue laminated onto a box. This allows for a high quality four-color flyer to be on the box. If your box is displayed on the shelf of a store or at a seminar, this may be a way of attracting prospective customers. Just like offset printing, litho labeled boxes become less expensive per box the more you order. Other boxes include software and hardware computer folding boxes, custom set-up boxes, retail store and cosmetic boxes and industrial folding boxes. Most of these boxes are made of a material called SBS and range in thickness of 18 point to 24 point like the thickness of a cereal box. Planning in advance is the key to having a great looking functionable box. Suppliers of boxes can be found under packaging or boxes.
Albums for CD’s, Video and Audio Cassettes, Binders: These albums are vacuum formed molded to meet your specific application. For example: You are marketing a series of four videos and a study guide on debt reduction. You can use these albums to hold all four videos and the study guide with a four color insert sealed into the front, spine and back of the album. Generic albums are sold with a clear open plastic so you can insert your own printed piece. Be aware that if you want a high quality finished look it is best to find a company that will handle the the entire job. These companies can generally be found under packaging or video and audio cassette duplication. If you have a special custom album be prepared to pay for tooling costs which typically range from $700.00 to $2500.00.
Bags and gift boxes: Many printers are set up to subcontract bags and gift boxes. Shopping bags generally come in plastic or paper and paper with lamination. There is a wide selection of sizes and colors standard in the industry with options of hundreds of papers, inks and foils for customizing. Gift boxes are also available in many standard sizes usually in white or natural kraft. These boxes can be printed or foiled and can be made custom to your specification. Expect to pay more for customized boxes and bags. You can find supplier in the classified section under packaging, boxes or bags or contact your printer or printing broker.
There are many alternative ways to package products. Planning is the key to marketing a successful product. Take time to research and contact several printers and vendors to find the one that will best suit your needs and find a packaging medium that fits within your budget.
7. Planning Your Next Printing Job:
Printing companies vary greatly in size, equipment, market and business
goals. To manage a variety of printing jobs, you need to know the benefits
that many printers can offer you. You many have three or four printers for
routine jobs. Many companies work with printing brokers who have the
experience and expertise in working with many trade printers, finding the
best quality for the lowest price, thus allowing you more time for other
areas of your business. If you want to work directly with a printer, work
with a variety of printers to assure maximum control over quality, schedule
and price. To get the best price, you must use specifications to shop among
printers. Printers have niche markets in which they are most competitive and
efficient. As you work with printers you will learn their niche and only
solicit bids for those shop who you think can handle your project.Even with
the guidelines, you often find yourself in a gray area where only experience
can shape your judgement.
Regular printers are especially convenient for reruns because the job
already meets their specifications. You can order over the phone and confirm
by fax. The trade custom giving printers ownership of negatives that they
make helps printers get reruns. With major jobs, you may get lower prices
when you keep control over plate-ready materials so you can solicit new
quotes each time the job repeats.
You may find that your regular printers cannot do jobs as fast or
inexpensively as some other printer. Knowing when to consider alternatives
to your regular printers requires making judgments about individual jobs.
You must decide whether a job is too large or small, has quality standards
too high or low, or has some other aspect that makes it unsuited to one of
your regular printers. Every printing job is unique and every printer has an
individual mix of equipment, skills and materials. Finding printers suited
to your jobs requires hard work but pays many dividends when it develops
dependable relationships.
When requesting a quotation from a printer, the printer may ask for the
following information:
Overview: Organization name, address, phone and fax number, contact person,
P.O. #, job name, date quote needed, delivery needed, new job or reprint.
Prepress: Electronic files supplied, film supplied, camera ready art.
Artwork contact person
Printing: Quantities, quality, format (size, trim size, page count, covers,
etc) Ink colors (one side or two), Coatings, other printing services (die
cut, foil stamp, etc)
Paper: Weight, brand, color, finish, grade
Finishing & Binding: Will dummy be supplied? Trim, fold, type of fold.
Scoring, perforation etc.
Packing & Delivery: Bulk pack, band, shrink wrap, pallet, etc. Will call,
deliver or ship via.
When evaluating quotes from printers, check first that the price actually
relies on your specifications. The quote should refer to your job number or
product name from your request for quotation. Look for an answer to every
question about cost, condition of copy, type of proofs, packaging and
delivery time. Most printers hold quoted prices firm for thirty or sixty
days, excluding the cost of paper. Printers may be unable to anticipate
price increases, so the paper prices may be subject to current rates.
Here are some tips about how to negotiate if things go wrong. Despite
everyone¹s best efforts, a printer occasionally delivers a job that doesn¹t
satisfy you. When that happens, you must express your unhappiness, listen to
the printer¹s point of view, and arrive at a solution that works for each of
you. In addition, you need to feel clear about the relationship you want
with the printer after you have settled today¹s issue. Before you pick up
the phone or rush to the print shop, ask yourself how serious the problem
really is. If it¹s a critical error, you can¹t accept the job. This
situation is rare. If it¹s a major defect, you need to judge its impact.
This happens once in a while. If it¹s a minor flaw, you may choose to ignore
it. Every job contains at least one minor flaw. You have the right to reject
a job that doesn¹t match the specifications on which your contract was
based. Only exercise that right when you discover a critical error. Printers
work on small profit margins that you destroy when you refuse a job. Notify
the printer at once. Don¹t delay. Even if you need a few days to determine
the extent of the problem, let the printer know immediately that you don¹t
feel satisfied. If possible, get the printer involved in inspecting the job
to verify the situation. After you and your printer agree on the facts, you
can move toward a resolution. Your printer will ask you how you want to
handle the situation. The most common technique is to deduct 10 or 20
percent from the invoice for this job.
8. Trade Customs:
Quotations. An offer to print a job at a certain price is good for a
specific length of time usually sixty days.
Cancellations. If you cancel a job, your printer may ask for payment for
materials ordered or
work performed for that job.
Ownership. Your printer may claim ownership of materials prepared at your
request. The issue of ownership relates to physical objects, such as
mock-ups and film, and to right to creative work such as designs. Copyright
Law gives the rights to designs and illustrations to artists who create them
unless the contract between artist and customer says that the customer owns
rights because the work was ³work for hire².
Specifications. Printers base price estimates on your specifications. If
your job doesn¹t match your specifications, your printer may compute a new
price. Electronic files and art must be exactly as you described.
Alterations. When you change any aspect of original specifications at any
stage in the job, your printer can compute a new price. To communicate
clearly, make your change orders in writing.
Proofs. You are responsible if you don¹t order proofs, don¹t review them
quickly, or don¹t put your approval or changes in writing. Remeber,
accountability for the accuracy of final copy lies with you.Furthermore, the
printer can charge extra if you arrive late for a press check or make last
minute changes. Color proofing causes the most headaches. Trade customs say
that you must accept ³a reasonable variation in color between proofs and the
completed job² but don¹t define ³reasonable variation.²
Overruns and underruns. 10 percent is common, and the invoice is adjusted
accordingly. If you need ³no less than² a certain quantity, make sure to
include that requirement in your specifications.
Customer property. Your printer insures your property while in the shop, but
always keep backups as your only true insurance. If you supply photos or
original art of unusual value, deal with a printer or insurance company who
will provide extra coverage.
Delivery. Your job is delivered when ownership passes from your printer to
you. If the printer delivers to your address, you own the job when the truck
unloads. If the printer ships via common carrier, you own the job when it
leaves the shop.
Schedule. Printers stay on schedule when customers stay on schedule.
Supplied materials. Materials, such as flats or paper, must conform to
printer specifications. If they don¹t conform, you pay for changes or
delays.
Claims. You report defects, damages or shortages in writing within fifteen
days of delivery. Failure to report within fifteen days means that you
accept the job as meeting specifications, furthermore, if a job is
unacceptable, the job must be returned in its entirety, using some of the
job will constitute acceptance.
Liability. Your printer won¹t pay more than the printed value for defective
goods or missed deadlines and especially won¹t pay for lost profits.
Furthermore, you can¹t hold your printer liable for printing your job that
violates a copyright or trademark or that has libelous or obscene content.
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