My nightmare with the printers

[that mike guy]

I was getting 5000 business cards printed. Full color, double sided, high gloss. White on one side, Dark red on the other)

they ran a week over the deadline and only could get my 2000 of them. The red turned out to be PURPLE (even though my red was c=0% m=100% y=100% b=30%). Plus the card's werent glossy at all

Also the ink rubbed off on your fingers. Wasn't a drying issue, since it would do the same thing a few days after.

So the client was pissed obviously and the printers agreed to reprint them at no extra cost. They said they forgot to 'coat them', and this time i asked specifically for high gloss. They apologized, said they would take extra care, coat them varnish them, blah blah...

So 2 more weeks, I get the cards back, and same damn thing. PURPLE cards and the ink rubs off even easier...

I said this was bullshit. They apologized and gave me my money back (because i paid up-front, stupid me.)

Soo, I still need to get these cards done. I need these to be super kick ass, high gloss, above average (cause now thats what the client is going to expect).

Are there any printers who can do this with paper business cards? Or am I asking the impossible?

[jimking]

Did you have these printed from your local printer or a Internet printer?
What kind of printing was it--offset or digital. It sounds digital to me because its sounds like you've could have set it up as a spot color instead of 4/color giving you better results. Also the build 0/100/100/30 should have come out as a slightly dark red not purple. However if printer transposed the cyan with yellow you would have ended up with purple which is a dumb error and kind of hard to do these days as far as offset is concerned. You should be able to get better results easily than what you got.

[that mike guy]

Did you have these printed from your local printer or a Internet printer?
What kind of printing was it--offset or digital. It sounds digital to me because its sounds like you've could have set it up as a spot color instead of 4/color giving you better results. Also the build 0/100/100/30 should have come out as a slightly dark red not purple. However if printer transposed the cyan with yellow you would have ended up with purple which is a dumb error and kind of hard to do these days as far as offset is concerned. You should be able to get better results easily than what you got.

It was a local printer...and hedelay at the beginning was cause because they started doing it digitally, but something crewed up, so they had to restart and do it offset.

[jimking]

That is very strange that the first time it was digital and the result was purple but when they went to offset the result was still purple? 0-cyan 100-magenta 100-yellow 30-black. If this is the correct build, they transposed the yellow with cyan. It's the only way you'll get a purple. They must still be outputting film instead of direct to plate. When they decided to go offset I'm surprised they didn't talk to you about going with a spot pms instead of 4/color.

[Gromit801]

NEVER, ever give a printer a color choice in percentages. That means the press guy is going to have to manually mix the colors, and he may goof. ALWAYS use Pantone numbers when dealing with print shops.

Now, that being said, the printer should have brought your percentages up on the screen, and matched them to a Pantone number. At the least, called you and asked you about a match.

[christydezignz]

Another thing that I would do is make sure you give the printer a COLOR PRINT for the pressman to match it to. Then they will "Match to Color". Since you created this in
4 color I would get them done digitally. (That way the color won't rub off either.) I've had good luck with www.printingforless.com (http://www.printingforless.com). They have low pricing, it's easy to use, it's digital and they have have gloss paper with the option of acqueous coating (which would give you a higher gloss and makes the colors really pop)! Unfortunatly with digital the color matching isn't as easy as offset. Check your numbers again, and make sure that your next choice of printer knows about your past experience.

PS I would stay away from the small FRANCHISED shops, had bad luck with those. It may be cheap, but the color always seems to rub off and they usually have not clue about printing (in my experience) God bless those who do!

[jimking]

christydezignz is correct. Did you receive a proof before print, and did it look purple? Gromit801, not sure what you mean. When a client supplies the printer with a file, all percentages of color builds, spot percentages etc. are within the file. Unless it's verbal. If there is no cyan in the color build and it prints purple, cyan is being used when it shouldn't. I think something eles is going on.

[mojoprime]

christy,

have you had much luck with reprints from printingforless? i've been reading in these forums about how they shift depending on who you use (and from everyone is saying, the phase of the moon), but i was wondering how they would hold up on a reprint.

never used an on-line printer before, and i was thinking about trying for a freelance gig i have, but i don't want to fubar it. and i worked up one of the designs in 3-color, so might as well have it printed 4CP. so, would it better to pick pantones and then convert to 4CP, so they'd at least have a color chip to target?

[Gromit801]

Jim, I was referring to the habit many designers have of mixing a color in the swatch pallet of InDesign or Photoshop. A pressman would really much rather have a Pantone number, which they can usually obtain in a premix ink, instead of dealing with mixing ink according to percentages supplied.

A good pressman can mix ink accordingly, but I've seen it screwed up too many times by pressmen in a rush.

[Maddie]

No advice for you, but I think we have the same printer!

2,000 business cards for our biggest client. The proofs looked good, but the cards were grainy and streaked. Their 4-color printer was unpredictable. We upgraded to Pantone spot color printing, hoping for a sure thing. They got the registration off by quite a bit. They did them a third time. The client was hopping mad by then, after having to write their contact info on cocktail napkins for a week.

The third printing was off register too. They never did get it right. We had to take them (at a discount, at least) because the client needed them yesterday. I actually had to fight with the manager to remove the charge for the first failed run. Ooo, I hate that printer.