Print

Aug 7, 20269 min readGuideBy Argo Shipping

How to buy print without getting burned

Three printers, three quotes, three different numbers, and no way to tell whether you are comparing the same job. That is the normal experience of buying print, and it is not because printers are evasive. It is because a print job has more variables than most buyers specify, so each printer fills the gaps with their own assumptions. Here is how to specify a job so the quotes are comparable, and what to ask when they are not.

Why quotes diverge

Ask three printers for "500 booklets, 16 pages, full color" and you have specified perhaps half of what determines the price. The unspecified half includes trim size, interior and cover stock, coating, binding, bleed, proof type, packing, and delivery date. Each printer will assume something reasonable, and their assumptions will differ.

So the cheapest quote is frequently the one that assumed the lightest stock and no coating, and you will not discover that from the quotes. This is the single biggest source of print buying frustration, and it is entirely fixable by specifying more precisely.

The specification that makes quotes comparable

Everything on this list changes the price. Specify all of it, or specify that you want a recommendation and will accept theirs.

That list looks long and takes about ten minutes once. It is the difference between three comparable quotes and three months of confusion.

The five questions to ask about any quote

1. What does this assume that I did not specify?

The most valuable question you can ask a printer, and a good one will answer it directly. Anything they had to assume is a place where the quote could move or where you are comparing unlike things.

2. What would make this cheaper?

A printer knows things you do not: whether your trim size is efficient on their press sheets, whether a slightly different stock is substantially cheaper, whether a small dimensional change adds an up. As our note on how print pricing works explains, a small size change can meaningfully cut paper cost. A printer who volunteers this is telling you something about how they intend to work with you.

3. What is quoted instantly and what needs a person?

Most standard work can be priced immediately. Some cannot, and the honest answer names it. Foil stamping, embossing, spot UV, die-cutting, and PMS ink matching run through a finishing partner, carry a 1,000-piece minimum, and are quoted by hand. Hardcover books are produced through a third-party print partner and priced by a person. If your job includes any of these, an instant number is a number that may move.

We would rather route a job to a person than produce a confident wrong price, which is a design choice: when our estimating system cannot price something properly, it goes to review rather than generating a silent placeholder. A quote that arrives fast and changes later is worse than one that takes a day and holds.

4. What is the real production time, and what does expedite cost?

Ask for standard production time as a number, and ask what it depends on. Ours is seven days for most standard work, and a date inside that window adds an expedite line. Also ask what the clock starts from, because it is almost always proof approval rather than order placement, which means your own review time is part of your schedule.

5. What happens if it comes out wrong?

The answer should reference a document rather than a sentiment. Ours: before a job runs, you get a proof. Nothing goes on press until you approve it in writing, and that approved proof is the standard we hold ourselves to. If the finished job does not match it because of a production error on our end, we make it right with a reprint or a refund. If it does match, and the proof itself had something you would rather change, we will help you fix it on the next run. Terms apply.

Notice what that does and does not cover, because the distinction is the whole substance. It covers a mismatch between the finished job and the proof you approved, caused by our error. It does not make us the guarantor of a design decision you made and signed off on. A printer promising satisfaction on any grounds whatsoever is promising something unbounded, which usually means it is not really promised at all.

Three ways buyers cost themselves money

Rushing the proof. Proof review is where errors get caught for free. Approving quickly to save a day and discovering a wrong price on 5,000 pieces is the worst trade in print buying. The clock usually starts at your approval anyway, so a careful review costs less schedule than people assume.

Specifying by product rather than by use. "I need a perfect-bound book" is a specification. "I need something people will write in and prop open on a desk" is a brief, and it will get you a better answer, possibly a different binding entirely. Our note on choosing a binding method covers why perfect binding a workbook is the most common regret in the category.

Taking the biggest quantity break available. The break is real; so is obsolescence. Cost per piece actually used is the number that matters, and it frequently favours a smaller run than the price curve suggests.

What a good printer relationship looks like

Print is one of the last genuinely craft-adjacent commercial services, and the relationship compounds in ways that a transactional approach does not capture. A printer who knows your brand colors, your usual stocks, your typical quantities, and the fact that your workbooks have to lie flat will catch problems before they reach a proof.

Two practical mechanics of that. Reordering from a previous job rather than re-specifying is a real time saving and a real error reduction, since the file and settings are already proven. And having print sit alongside fulfillment means the printed piece and the parcel that carries it get planned together, which is the subject of print and fulfillment under one roof.

We have been printing for clients nationwide for over forty years, and the thing that has changed most is not the presses. It is that the printed piece is now usually one part of an order that also has to be stored, kitted, and shipped, which makes the handoffs matter more than the press specs.

The bottom line

Print quotes are hard to compare because print jobs have more variables than buyers usually specify. Write one specification, send the same text to everyone, and ask each printer what they assumed.

Then ask what would make it cheaper, what needs a human to price, when the clock starts, and what happens if it comes out wrong. Those five questions will tell you more about a printer than the number at the bottom.

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