Grub Street Printing Newsletter, September 2014, No. 65

I've been reading a newsletter entitled The Digital Nirvana for a few years now, more than occasionally to see what combination of e-something or another with the printing process has the writers worked into a frantic lather.

And one of the first and most basic options offered by wiring a Mac to a Heidelberg press was variable information printing for direct marketers: ie. junk mail pretending to be something else.

Now, I've got about five years in the print industry before I discovered book printing, and I appreciate that there are some pedestrian ways to make a buck with a press. And printing books is the apex of the print industry as far as I'm concerned.

So getting misty-eyed about getting the latest personalized AmEx credit card deal stuffed into a million mailboxes doesn't happen to give me a warm fuzzy feeling. Still, I can appreciate that some printer got paid for printing something that I may not open, surely won't read. and that's destined for either my industrial strength shredder or the shopping bag for paper recycling by my desk.

And in spite of all the great advice proffered in The Digital Nirvana (here, here and here for example), when personalization doesn't work quite right, the results can be funny...and depressing. And the point isn't lost on them as they point out the consequences of personalized flubs on the internet and bemoan the goofs of direct mail when it lands in their mailbox.

I remember getting a personalized flyer from HP back in 2004 or so at the Baker Johnson, Inc. shop promoting the variable data (personalization) opportunities of their new press. Except it was addressed to Johnson Baker, Inc., totally muffing two of the three words in the business name. Nice shot but you missed the backboard.

It happened again a couple of years later when I got a letter addressed to Merican Perspective, Ltd.

That just seemed an obvious typo at the time, a misspelling of American Perspective, Ltd., the company that I use for occasional publishing.

Except it wasn't a typo the way I think of a typo, a correctable error. Over the years the flow of mail to Merican Perspctive Ltd.has grown and grown. Here are 3 examples from the past two weeks.

This “typo” is so ingrained in the shroud of big data that when I was on a government web site this past spring, four business names were displayed with the question, “Do you now or have you ever had a business relationship with any of these companies?” And there it was, Merican Perspective Ltd.

What was the right answer? The digital cognoscenti would have you believe that since mail to Merican Perspective, Ltd. has been delivered to my address for at least ten years, there clearly is a business relationship. But since I know that Merican Perspective, Ltd doesn't even exist, is there a correct answer? (And why the hell doesn't the US Government know that there's no such company?)

I logged off and dialed the 800 number.

  

Flat Rate Priority Mail Rates Rise and Fall

While Flat Rate Priority Mail pricing will increase for you on September 7, your company will actually get a reduction in its Priority rates.

Big 5 vs. Amazon

Started to compete with Oyster and Scribd, Amazon's Kindle Unlimited all-you-can-read ebook service has showcased the split between the Big 5 publishers and Amazon. The list of available titles is huge but offers no ebooks from the Big 5. Amazon must disdain PR departments because it comes off as either a jerk or a bully these days.

Don't Pay for Kindle Unlimited

Sure, for around $120 per year you can download dozens of books you'll never read at Kindle Unlimited. Or you could do the same for free.

Charges Threatened Against RR Donnelly

International printer RR Donnelly declared its subsidiary in Argentina bankrupt when union contract talks broke off. Now the Argentine government is threatening RRD with criminal terrorist charges.

Typos of the Rich and Famous

I understand the chagrin you've experienced when a typo in the book you so carefully proofread and edited was found. Cheer up, you're in great company.

Printer's Row No Longer a Row

The area around Printer's Row has hosted many a Chicago Book Festival (now Printer's Row Lit Fest). But tough times for printers has whittled their numbers down to one surviving printer on Printer's Row, Palmer Printing.

 

Newspaper Publishes After Earthquake

Didn't you love those old movies where newspaper reporters used every trick possible to “break the story first”. In that same indefatigable spirit, the Napa Valley Register published its evening edition the same day its 50 ton press was relocated a few inches by the Napa Valley earthquake.

Are Your eBooks in Your Will?

A court in Delaware has ruled that the possessions of the deceased which can be legitimately passed on to the heirs includes all forms of digital accounts or devices. So glad that's settled!

Curation Questions

The Eaton Collection at UC Riverside houses the finest collection of science fiction and fantasy titles anywhere, with works dating back 500 years. Some faculty charge that new administrators are tampering with the very policies that led to the Collection's leadership role among writers and readers (such as abandoning physical books for e-editions).

Funny Money

A subjective gauge of an economy's health can be as simple as observing how consumers spend their money. When the rich treat it like Monopoly money there's usually trouble on the horizon. A $3.2 million comic book may portend some storms ahead. (As does the $38M recently spent at auction for a Ferrari 250 GT.)

$77M Counterfeit Ring Busted

A 15 year Secret Service investigation paid off when a sophisticated counterfeiting operation with bases in Israel and New Jersey was seized and the principles arrested. (that's 770,000 $100 bills.)

Design News

The Belgian Postal Department wanted to commemorate International Women's Day with a stamp. The design features 606 words of text from The Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women.

Final Thought

Books are delightful society. If you go into a room and find it full of books — even without taking them from the shelves they seem to speak to you, to bid you welcome. ~William Ewart Gladstone

A Substitute Newsletter: Remember the Maine!

Usually there's a big push to finish writing the newsletter at month's end. Generally I've waited until the last minute to finish it lest a major event occurs (like Amazon's stock dropping 99% when their delivery drone downs a 737) but the fact is that I need deadlines to ever finish anything.

This month was different. I wasn't around to write the newsletter. I skipped town for awhile and I don't enjoy typing on my laptop for long periods.

So there is no newsletter, per se, this month.

All you get is this. No doctor's excuse and the dog didn't eat the newsletter.

Just this story about how the world worked, how I believed it's supposed to work, and why so many of you with a history in this industry are coming to regard times past as the Golden Age of Publishing.

I know Thomas Wolfe wrote, “You can't go home again,” but also acknowledged that “All that he knew was that the years flow by like water, and that one day men come home again.”

This year, when we presented the idea of a family vacation to my grown children after a decade or so hiatus, we let them choose the destination.

I was a little surprised by their choice:York, Maine, a place we'd visited many times decades ago.

Years ago I traveled to York each August to spend a week-end or so with some of the nicest people I've ever known, eating, drinking and partying in Donald Weiser's backyard at the annual Weiser Books clambake. From Friday after hours until Monday afternoon, I spent my waking hours with these folks as they taught me the ins and outs of publishing and I shared what I knew of the process of book production.

Some years my whole family accompanied me to York. We'd stay along Long Sands in York, or occasionally by the beach in Ogunquit. And while I relaxed and partied with the Weiser staff on Saturday, my children spent their time on the beach, collecting little sea creatures then returning them to the tide pools and boogie-boarding in the shallow shore waters.

 Boogie boarding on Long Sands, mid 1990s

Telling the story of my relationship not only with Donald Weiser and his wife Betty Lunsted but all of their friends and associates would be far too expansive to relate here, but they were at once my customers, my friends, and my mentors.

My good friend Barbara (Aurora Press) had suggested I contact the Weisers back in the late1970s and while we were out East with our two year old daughter I stopped by the big blue house to actually meet Donald, Betty, Jay, Alden and a few others whose names elude me after these many years.

Jay Weiser, Whitney and me, October 1983

Who knew printers and publishers could form such a tight bond? I drove or flew first printings of their new titles to the Book Expo (then the ABA) because I would produce them on such a short schedule they couldn't be shipped. I often dined with them there, everyone exhausted from working the Expo all day, and not only met Weiser employees but publishers and distributors from around the world joined us. Each dinner was worth a semester of publishing graduate level courses. I tend to be somewhat out-going but I preferred listening to their discussions until Betty would bait me into offering a printer's perspective on whatever the topic was.

I had the same sort of discussions in York when I arrived on August Friday afternoons and they kindly included me in their TGIF get-together at a local watering hole. Some of the crew had attended BEA, some I hadn't seen in a year, and some were brand new rookies.

 TGIF Weiser style

Since it was difficult to bring a dish to pass when staying at the local motel, I arrived at the Weiser's house hours before the partiers arrived. Betty always asked me to trim the forsythia by the back stairs as its branches had grown over the stairs in the year since I'd last cut it. And chairs needed to be brought out from under the long porch, volleyball nets needed to be raised and croquet wickets placed. There were horseshoes to find, beer to ice and tablecloths to spread. I felt a part of the Weiser team on that day.

 One of the early clam bakes. (Russ the lobster man's truck in the foreground.)

Over the years the event grew and grew, from a large picnic in the backyard (moved inside to the porch when rainy) to a huge white tent with roll-down sides to block the elements if necessary. I'm guessing the first clambakes I attended had around twenty guests which swelled to over fifty in later years.

Socializing before the steamers are ready

After eating, the real socializing began. Again, publishers, book store owners, book distributors and authors were in attendance and while the volleyball game was playing, there were also many relaxed conversations between people from different sectors of our industry.

 

There were usually discussions between the publishers, editors, agents and store owners and authors after lunch

And always a wiffle ball game filled the late afternoon hours. Cans of beer sat at the outfielders' feet and many runners reached first base with one in their hand.

 

Wiffle ball with Donald playing a short stop “shift”

Finally the sun would set and the chill off the Atlantic pushed many from the yard to the porch. Interactions on the porch were varied not just year to year but hour by hour. Discussions about upcoming titles and analyzing new trends could devolve into singing and dancing at a moments notice.

Evenings on the porch swung between discussing the cosmos to abject silliness

It was often near midnight when I left, overwhelmed that I had just spent an afternoon with some of the most wonderful people I'd ever met.

I generally went to the office on Monday and tried to explain copy preparation or the differences in papers, their availability and pricing. Often we'd break for lunch, again with editors, designers, fellow publishers, etc.

 As close as I ever came to a Power Lunch

Afterward it was time for me to head back west. The drive home afforded me the opportunity to stop and visit many more of the publishers I worked with, each of whom I considered a special friend.

Howard proves he can pack books with his eyes closed

Unfortunately, this year, as in the past decade or so, there was no Weiser Books to visit, no clambake. I did, however have a chance to get together with friends from those wonderful times. I even ran into Howard by shear luck, a longtime friend of Donald and jack of all trades around Weiser Books.

There are publishers (and probably printers) who view the printer (or publisher) as an adversary, reducing all interaction to negotiating the best deal. I somehow think the internet has promoted that culture.

But I still believe that if you have a chance to work with your printer, you may get some suggestions that will improve the quality of your titles or even make your work a little easier.

Many people I work with in the industry believe (as I do) that we were part of the Golden Age of Publishing.

There are many in the industry today who could care less.

That's why I write to you each month. I'm proud of my industry friends, I respect their ability and integrity, and will gladly close up shop if I have to solicit work from people who don't share this ethic.

(PS Sorry Bob and Barb in Ohio, Paul and Amy in New York, Ehud in Vermont and Jean and Spencer in New Hampshire that I didn't stop by to say hello this trip. Maybe next time.)

The beat goes on: Myles meets Long Sands

Wayne A. Johnson
GrubStreetPrinting.com
wayne@grubstreetprinting.com
Toll-free & fax: 877.711.1229

Grub Street Printing Newsletter #63, July 2014

Do you have a web site? If so, you probably get recorded calls that begin, “Hi, I'm Sharon (sometimes Susan out west) your local Google specialist”.

Since it's a recorded message, anything (including all the blue language and invective I hurl back at old Sharon) is just a waste of time and breath (and at my age I'm increasingly cognizant of the finite amounts we have of each). Since some of our cordless phones don't have Caller ID, but even if they do, after stopping whatever I'm doing to walk down the hall to answer the phone call from Sharon, I feel entitled to a little psychic relief, and with children no longer running through the house, I unleash a full and increasingly creative barrage of invective that would make the devil himself blush. Cathy just smiles and asks, “Sharon?” and I nod.

Satisfied that I've created an ever more efficient way of cursing thieves and liars to eternal damnation, I continue my previous activity psychically cleansed if karmically damaged.

There is no greater proof of the impotence and corruption rampant in our federal government than the flagrant disregard corporations, ranging in size from Bruce the Window Cleaner to Wall Street banks sniffing out mortgage refi clients, exhibit by their incessant calling of persons unknown and unconnected with their enterprises, flagrantly breaking the “No Call” rules Congress introduced in 2003 as a way to rile up their contributors who throw bigger bags of money to legislators when they've been riled.

That these organizations have banded together with the lobbyists like the Association to Send Senators Hoards Of Loot Everyday to fight for their God-given right to behave like petulant jack-asses says more about campaign finance laws than corporate morality (an oxymoron if I've ever heard one).

Now this “Sharon” (who might be a shrew of the first order but it's doubtful she's stupid enough to use her real name) says she's a Google specialist. I've been using Google without need of a specialist for many years so I assumed that since Google knows more about me than I know about me, they simply called my phone number (which they of course already had) and decided to help me make better use of Boolean parameters when I did my searches.

Except that skank Sharon is to Google what I am to RR Donnelly...I've heard of them and know what business they're in. And that's about it.

It turns out that Sharon works for a company called Pacific Telecom Communications Group. Given that they use the word Pacific in their name, I've decided that they are either located in Southern California (having crawled out from under a rock in Death Valley) or outside of the US, probably in one of the Asian nations that sends us some sort of fatal flu each fall.

I want to believe that no one is so bored with life that they've actually listened to Sharon's spiel, but having attained a wizened perspective after all these years, I've come to revise P. T. Barnum's observation that,”there's a sucker born every minute.” While perhaps true during the 19^th century when Barnum was milking the suckers, the population of our country has expanded and to update his maxim, “there are at least dozens of suckers born every minute” would be more accurate.

But probably somebody ( I HOPE none of you) has actually forked over money to these cheating charlatans who promise zillions of clicks on your website but deliver common, freely available advice on search-engine-optimization (SEO). (At least that's what a Google search says they're hawking.)

But what's even worse than that is that it wouldn't even matter if we were all intelligently cautious and ignored their irritating come-on. While PTCG will happily take our dollars, they have an even greater revenue stream that makes our continual harassment inevitable.

PTCG collects money from telephone companies every time their information is displayed on your phone when you answer.

So the important thing isn't that you buy their lousy product or even listen to their insipid pitch. They're just happy when you pick up the receiver or press the little green icon, or whatever it is you do to answer your phone.

Of course the question becomes why hasn't the might of the Federal Government slaughtered these vermin? It's certainly not because they're unaware of their existence. They seem to know all about them.

Apparently the burden of dealing with life or death matters like “did the IRS mess with the Tea Party”, and “what planet is John Boehner really from”, annoyances that the hoi polloi endure are allowed to fester. Our letters and emails of complaint pile up in a warehouse or are routinely scrubbed from Washington DC servers so as not to interfere with the real business of governance.

So if filling out an FTC form ratting out these perps makes you feel like you've contributed to the peace and happiness of future generations, who am I to tell you that you're wasting your time? As a child of the 60's, I say “If it feels good, do it.”

Myself, I revel in the millions of combinations and iterations afforded by the richness of the American English vernacular and will continue to try to ensure that no one associated with such shameful deportment has even the most minute opportunity to enjoy anything but eternal pain and strife in their afterlife.

Hey, you do your thing and I'll do mine. I suspect we'll each have an equal level of success in eliminating this vile harassment, but mine makes my wife laugh.

 

Check Out This InfoGraphic

From the moment you click on this you'll get a second by second account about what's being sold in America in real time. Book sales are shown foremost but sales from Amazon to Walmart to 7-11 and even coupon savings are shown. Note that ebooks sell in great volume but the dollars aren't even close to printed books.

Weighing In on Amazon vs. Hachette

Stephen Colbert has weighed in on the Amazon v. Hachette (his publisher) brouhaha and has asked his legion of fans to purchase Hachette's title Californias online from Portland based Powell's Books, as well as offering free “I Didn't Buy It At Amazon” labels from his website.

Book Expo Attendance Off

Attendance at this year's BookExpo was down slightly (again) while their one day cheapie tickets (aka Book Con; take that either way I suppose) sold all 10,000 available tickets in three minutes. The Comments following the linked article indicate Book Con was not an unmitigated success. See you in Chicago 2016 (follow the link: are Atlanta and Dallas really in the same destination class as prison camps?).

Monopoly vs. Cartel

This business writer assures us the fuss over Amazon and two major publishers is merely a monopoly fighting a cartel. With 2,675 publishers in the US alone, that's one hell of a big cartel. The writer then admits that as an author, he's displeased with the publishing industry business model (surprise!).

Ultra Short Print Runs

I still work with a lot of new authors/publishers and the question about how few books can they produce comes up frequently. While Grub Street Printing shies away from ultra-short runs (less than 100), LightningSource (a division of Ingram Book Distributing) does very short runs of digital books and claims that their average print run is between one and two books per order.

Ebooks or Print

Now that the dust is settling, the fact that only 4% of readers exclusively read ebooks means that if you want to reach the broadest reader market, printing conventional books is necessary.

The Almost Lost Art of Craft Bookbinding

When all books were bound by hand, creativity was used to enhance their looks and functionality. This short, non-technical article describes some techniques which are so uncommon now that soon there may not be binders capable of their execution.

Authors Validate Words

Over the years I've noticed that many in the book industry nurture a curiosity about word usage and origins. For the budding lexicographers, here is what the printed word has meant to linguistic evolution.

Print Is Still Big

After riding out a tumultuous couple of decades, the world of print may have diminished a bit, but it remains a huge industry with incredible reach.

Letterpress Never Died...

...nor has it faded away. I bought a $5 book online for scanning, but when it arrived it was a lovely mid 50's letterpress edition with just-visible impressions from the type. I really didn't want to take it apart to scan. Here's more on desktop publishing, circa 1820.

E Bonds, Not eBonds

The sale of US Savings Bonds plummeted in 2012 after the Treasury Department decided to go paperless. Now some legislators are advocating a reversal of the paperless only bonds (H. Res. 97), saying the program provided a savings plan for many low income earners.

Final Thought

A truly good book teaches me better than to read it. I must soon lay it down, and commence living on its hint.... What I began by reading, I must finish by acting. Henry David Thoreau

Grub Street Printing Newsletter #62, June, 2014

Happy 20^th birthday Amazon!

Next month marks a milestone for the folks at Amazon.com.

And while I've sold books through Amazon, I can't bring myself to say, “God bless Amazon” (unless we're talking about a rainforest).

Look, twenty years ago there was no storm cloud that could have foretold the disruption that could be wrought on the publishing industry by a nerd from Princeton.

There were no rules then. Thousands of hopeful e-entrepreneurs tried to make a buck any way they could in the wild west that was gloriously described as ecommerce. Everything from Pampers to Purina was available online, and services from licit match making to illicit rendezvous promised a brave new world, Y2K be damned.

In that spirit, Jeff Bezos realized that book retailing was one of the more moribund retail sectors with the newest rules written sixty years earlier when publishers, desperate to sell books during the depression, instituted “return” privileges to book stores in a valiant attempt to keep the presses rolling.

And forty years later Borders and Barnes & Noble learned to game the system by lining their walls with enough titles to fill a 5,000 square foot showroom. The problem for publishers was, their books were wall paper that changed every ninety days when the books were returned for credit and perhaps then immediately reordered.

Bezos saw a way to streamline book selling that concentrated on deep discounts and cheap and fast shipping. And every book that was available would be available, either through his warehouse network or directly, shipped from the publisher. And that worked so well he expanded into Pampers and Purina after the first wave of start-ups crashed and burned.

And it was fun and exciting, especially because there were no rules. After the tech bubble burst in 2000, legislators seemed especially receptive to keep ecommerce growing, even though the local communities the legislators represented were beginning to falter as Main Street saw dollars floating away to other cities in other states.

As you read the attached newsletter, the portrait of a company that believes it has an obligation to further disrupt the industry by dictating business practices to its suppliers emerges. Now I suppose if you're building cars, suppliers come and go and if you lose one, another will take its place producing an identical part to identical specs. That's not really possible with books, although it seems Bezos would like the industry to approximate such a scenario.

Another article explains that some government lackey issued a patent to Amazon for photographing objects against a white back ground. The stupidity of some government employees is surpassed only by the chutzpah of a company like Amazon that would file such an application, perhaps with hopes that all photographic techniques might be patented with royalties collected each year on April 15.

Amazon is tax averse and drops some money here and there in an attempt to alter the perception that they're bad neighbors, but Amazon executives are asked not to visit certain states lest their presence trigger local tax opportunities.

And how could Amazon be bad? President Obama has twice visited their warehouses, a seeming nod to today's youth that their future lies in the services arena, supervised and judged by computers that will eventually replace them and owned by companies that let their employees pay the taxes that the companies themselves could otherwise owe.

 

Sixty Largest Publishers

Are you curious about who the real heavy-hitters in publishing are by sales rank? You'll find the list here (hint: Pearson wins handily).

Amazon Tries to Bully Hachette...

Apparently the feud between Amazon and Hachette has escalated to the point that Amazon has dropped some Hachette titles, dragged their feet on shipping their titles, and now it seems won't even be offering JK Rowling's newest, The Silkworm, as a conventional book, although ebook and audible versions can be ordered. The roots of the conflict aren't clear yet.

...and Bonnier

Flexing one's monopolistic muscle seems to be addictive as Amazon attempts to also dictate terms to Bonnier, a Swedish publishing conglomerate. The debate over the heft and scope of Amazon's influence has re-ignited.

Backlist eBook Rights

The question about ownership of rights to produce ebooks will apparently be debated in federal court as HarperCollins sues to block Open Roads release of an ebook of the 1972 children's title, Julie of the Wolves.

Out-Amazoning Amazon

An extremely ambitious entrepreneur makes some telling statements on the demise of Borders and starts an enterprise to compete with Amazon...on price!

Book Business or eBook Business?

I get that ebooks are here to stay. But readers prefer ink and paper books 60% to 40% and publishers prefer conventional books overwhelmingly ($). So why does this email edition of Book Business have seven out of nine articles focusing on ebooks?

Amazon! Really?

I'm guessing that somewhere in your house you have a photograph of someone or something in front of a white background. Henceforth, all such pictures will be covered by a newly granted patent owned by Amazon. Stephen Colbert comments on the idiocy of it all.

The Colbert Report
Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,The Colbert Report on Facebook,Video Archive

Mass Market Paperback Pioneer Dies

Mass market paperbacks appeared in the late 1930's and were as disruptive to the industry as ebooks were over a half century later. Their sales didn't surpass hardcover sales until 1960, possibly with the help of Oscar Dystel who introduced Catcher in the Rye, East of Eden and many more classics for Bantam Books. Mr Dystel died at the age of 101 on May 28.

Do the Graphic Arts Include Printing?

Every printer I work with (and myself) has horror stories about working with a clueless designer whose knowledge begins and ends at a Mac Pro screen. The trouble is, after twenty some years of digital design advances, many of the instructors remain as clueless as their students about the leap from RGB to CMYK. Does it matter? Is print THAT important.? Check this out. (Hint: If your designer knows what rubylith is, they're okay.)

Which Cities Read the Most?

Data collected between April 2013 and April 2014 (based on book and magazine sales) ranks Ann Arbor 6^th in book purchases in America. The top twenty cities are listed here. But it's been pointed out that if you factor in the community's library circulation, the rankings are pure bs. They simply rank per capita online book spending which may not correlate to book reading.

Warning: This Novel is Rated G With Objectionable Language

In an effort to protect people from dealing with some of the more distasteful life experiences, certain colleges want to put warning labels on literature so readers aren't confronted with the more painful episodes that life presents. But isn't that the point of reading literature, to be challenged?

Final Thought

“One of the great things about books is sometimes there are some fantastic pictures.”

George W. Bush

Grub Street Printing Newsletter #61, May 2014

If the name Baker Johnson, Inc. rings a bell, I've known you for at least nine years. It also means you remember the capabilities and markets we served back in the day.

But the great thing about Grub Street Printing is that none of those caveats apply anymore. Printers specialize in producing books that take advantage of their equipment's capabilities. Sheet-fed printers, like Baker-Johnson, Inc., tend to be most efficient on shorter runs. The web printers we work with like runs so long they wear out their plates running them.

But guess what? Grub Street Printing doesn't own any equipment! We serve about 99% of the book manufacturing marketplace because we work with printers that have all kinds of money invested in every kind of press or binder you can imagine (except gravure and I've never been asked to quote a book produced gravure).

In hopes that you'll forgot the limitations of our days at Baker Johnson, Inc., I offer the following.

1. Grub Street Printing does digital...lots of digital. Since we are a part of a small press (we published our first book in 2002), learning about and using digital methods was a natural step for us. Even if you're using a printer that we don't happen to work with, we don't mind spending as much time as necessary to help you get your book ready for CreateSpace or LightningSource at no charge to you. It's fun, remember?
2. Last month we requested pricing on an oblong casebound ultra-short run 4/c (CMYK) and got competitive pricing from three different printers that had the equipment to efficiently produce such a book. Never assume Grub Street can't produce unusual books.
3. Grub Street Printing has produced quantities as low as 100 and as high as 37,000, competitively and of the highest quality.
4. Baker-Johnson, Inc. also specialized in perfect bound books, but one of the first books American Perspective (our small press) produced was a 500 copy casebound book with dust jacket and slipcase, utilizing seven different paper stocks, foil stamping on cover 1 and spine, and blind embossing on the case and slipcase. (Sorry. We're sold out.) Casebound is no problem and our pricing is fantastic.

5. Mechanical bindings are no problem either; plastic comb, plastic spiral, wire spiral, double O wire...you get the point, right?
6. Full color offset books are no problem either. We have domestic and international printers delivering the highest quality work at the lowest prices we can find anywhere.
7. By utilizing our network of free-lancers, we can put you in touch with just the right person to lend you a hand. We work with editors and designers across the country. I've personally worked with some of these pros over twenty-five years and will gladly vouch for their talent and creativity, but of course references are available.
8. Speaking of services, when you need a bar code in a hurry, email us your ISBN and pricing preference and we'll send the files to your designer or printer within 24 hours. Free, as in no charge.
9. We have a small program that tells us exactly what your next soft cover title will weigh and what it's bulk will be. These aren't real difficult calculations anyway, but this little spreadsheet takes about 10 seconds to figure it all out at once. I'll even share it with you for the asking.
10. And while it's probably not applicable to you, since closing Baker-Johnson, Inc. I've taught classes in book production and publishing which means that I still enjoy working with first timers, self publishers and micro-presses. That's how it all starts, isn't it?

So that's about it. We can pretty much produce any kind of book in any run length you want, cheaper than the printer you're using.

Which means I'm glad Baker-Johnson, Inc. never had to compete with GrubStreetPrinting.com 

 

Coming to a Store Near You This Saturday

Saturday, May 3, is “Free Comic Book Day” which sounds like one of my childhood dreams come true (although they were only 10¢ back then). Click here to find a participating merchant near you.

eCommerce Discovers Print

To boost profit margins, the digerati have discovered that print indeed has an audience and can positively support online marketing campaigns. What insight!

Millennials Prefer Paper Coupons

The generation of Americans who have grown up using multiple digital services prefers couponing with paper and ink coupons. I suspect that's because digital offers are subject to bait and switch and retailer double-talk.

A New Eco Font

After learning that the Garamond font used less printing ink than Times Roman, I changed this newsletter's font to Garramond. It has always been a popular book font, easy to read and scale. Now a new “eco-font” has been introduced, Ryman Eco, and freely distributed. It's very nice but I find Garamond much easier to read. Download Ryman Eco here. (Apparently not for use in Open Office.)

The Use of Trees...

Unfortunately, while discussing the eco benefits of these new fonts, the statement, “Of course, using no paper at all would do a lot more to help the environment” which is only partially true. There are more (and healthier) trees growing in America today than there were when the Pilgrims landed, thanks to (for profit) forest management.

...and Water

One billion people lack access to clean drinking water, and critical regional droughts have focused scientists' attention on safeguarding current water supplies and rethinking usage from dwindling sources. Since it takes 2 ½ gallons of water to make one sheet of 8 ½ x 11 paper, manufacturers need to rethink their use of water used for manufacturing paper.

Bookshelf Snooping

I'm shameless about walking over to someone's bookshelf and checking out their collection. I think you could almost guess someone's age by the books they display. Here's an interesting look at some of the most influential titles in the collections of the rich and famous.

3D “Ink” from Water Bottles

I remain unconvinced that 3D printing has much to do with printing, but an interesting twist in that technology is a new “open source” converter that makes 3D printer filament from used water bottles. Now your 3D printer can build the parts for a converter that will replace retail filament with DIY.

More Design Challenges

Graphic designers always seem to have interesting creations that display their skills and creativity, like these business cards designed for historical figures.

What Are Libraries For?

After reading about a library without books in Texas, I now know that libraries need to be more than paper and ink repositories. This story of a young man teaching himself how to build a prosthesis on the local library's 3-D printer demonstrates that good libraries are for free, unstructured education.

Inkjet for 4/c Book Production

In the way that toner-based printing changed how we thought about book production, warehousing and fulfillment, 4 color (CMYK) inkjet book printing may offer the same options for full color short run book printing. I just quoted such a title, and believe me, the economies are NOT readily available yet.

Employee Owned Print Shop Adds Book-selling

Collective Copies, a copy shop in Western MA, will add book-selling to its printing business. It also publishes titles as Levellers Press and its imprints.

Playboy's Future from the Past?

Struggling for a foothold in the digital age, Playboy has found profits in issuing anthologies and in this case, a reprint of Issue #1.

Perspective on Fonts

While I'm not a big fan of TED talks, this video on the changing art of font design by Mathew Carter is a refresher course, offering a modern perspective on how different media require different fonts.

Final Thoughts

“A mind needs books as a sword needs a whetstone, if it is to keep its edge.” George R.R. Martin -

Game of Thrones