Printing and the Environment

The printing process and the way in which individual printed projects are designed both have an impact on the environment.

However, there are many ways in which this impact can be reduced. The printing industry itself has come a long way over the past couple of decades in changing the way it works to reduce its effect on the environment, mainly through the use of new technologies that have become available.

These technologies have reduced the environmental impact of printing considerably. It is important to understand them so that designers and printers can work together to continuously improve the environmental performance of the printing sector.

At Mission Stream, we endeavour to reduce our impact on the environment through digital printing. You can print shorter runs to reduce paper and other waste at the make-ready stage and to ensure you print only what you need, when you need it. Land fill sites are full of discarded printed pieces because the unit price was 20% cheaper if you printed 5,000 more units than you actually needed.

We use suppliers who have strict environmental policies in place to reduce the carbon footprint we leave behind. To that end, Mission Stream has partnered with Konica Minolta to return and recycle all our toner bottles through their “Clean Planet Program.”

Here’s an example of the labels used to ship our toner bottles to be recycled.

When we all do our part, we can all make a difference.

 

The ePallete And You

Pallets aren’t just for painters anymore.

Ric here with a quick tip for any designer type out there or really anyone using an art program to create coloured documents. If you’ve decided on a colour scheme (if you haven’t, consider registering at COLOURlovers and find a few that suit your project) and want quick access to the different colours you’ve picked for your work, make a small box with each colour chosen for your project as a fill. Keep these boxes just inside the art box or out on the paste board (the white or grey area around the actual file size), preferably on a separate layer so you can lock or toggle the view of them when you want a clear look at the project.

“But Ric,” I already hear you saying, “Isn’t that exactly what the swatches tab does?” Yes, it is. I guess adobe had this idea before I did, but this method does offer a few advantages. Firstly, you will probably have a few swatches in the official swatches tab that you don’t need. Secondly, maybe you’re like me and OCD about closing all the tabs you don’t need open at that very
instance. Thirdly, you may find it a tad quicker to just select the item you want to colour, hit the ‘i’ key (for eyedropper tool) and just click on the box that has the colour you want. Also, if you’re using a few different stroke options, you can set up a few more shapes with the different stroke settings for quick access, lets see the swatch tab do THAT.

I’ve been using this technique for a while now and someone else out there finds it useful. Do you have any time-saving tricks for a specific software you spend hours every day staring at? Let us know!

 

Business Card Templates

This morning I had a conversation with a client who is undergoing a major rebranding. Since all of their stationary will change, we were discussing business cards when she suggested that they were thinking of printing shells and overprinting names as they are required.

Of course, a digital printer does not have to print shells since we print four colour business cards efficiently and inexpensively. In this client’s case, since it is a non-standard size of cards (folded!), it may still make financial sense for them to create and print offset shells. Mind you, it’s still a waste of money.

For those of us who want to save money and help the environment, 250 or 500 business cards are printed 4/4 for less than $50 now. There’s the online options for someone who wants to do business without talking to a person or who needs one or two sets, there’s your cheap local printer who runs on an older type of colour machine and there’s larger printers who will print your cards offset in large runs at an excellent price per name – as long as you need 30 names. So there are options.

Our solution is a simple one. We use our variable software to link a custom template from our client to an Excel database that inserts the name and personal information from the card into the template. This creates a PDF that is sent to our client for their okay. Once the okay is received, we send the names required to our digital presses using our custom cutting forms. Then the sheets are off to our slitters, where the cards are cut and boxed. It’s quick, simple and inexpensive for our end users.

If your requirements for business cards are over 6 names per month, we set up a pricing matrix so you know what your costs are for the year. Then emails can be sent with orders and billing can be completed by the month. Department codes can be included if needed.

This will enable your employees to minimize administration and it virtually eliminates the time required for your design centre to set up each card. It streamlines the system and creates almost no waste from those printed shells.

As everyone knows, when someone joins an organization or receives a promotion, one of the most important things is to print those cards quickly. The enthusiasm of new employees is palpable to the entire organization. As the days pass without cards for the new hire, that excitement wanes. So be proactive, get those cards quickly and into the hands of those who need them. Morale will be boosted and everyone is more positive.

Do you agree with me on the above paragraph? Let us know.

If you are interested in our time saving solution, call us to discuss!

 

SHHH….don’t tell this to another printer!!!

Need another reason to deal with us instead of the other guys?

We prefer to receive X1A PDF files when jobs are supplied to us. This way we know that all graphics and fonts will be included (and embedded) and we won’t have to go back and bug the customer for support files. While this makes our lives (and our customers lives) much easier, we sometimes get requests for text changes,  colour changes or even requests to change images or logos after the hard or soft proof is given to our customer.

If you print with the other guys and were to request this, they may have to ask you to provide the support files to be able to make the changes. We have software called Pitstop that allows us to make these changes to the PDF without having to go back for source files.

This turns complicated tasks such as adding a comma from something that would delay the job for a whole day going back and forth for files, to something that takes us a couple of minutes to fix. And usually if it’s a change that doesn’t require another proof we don’t charge for it either!

Pitstop also allows us to do quick checks on each PDF to make sure they are okay to print. We can preflight your files to assure you of the best quality.  You can also (with the proper X1A PDF, not any PDF) change text, images, fonts, colours, move around objects and even resize pages.

Saving us valuable time allows us to get the job to you faster.

To learn more about Pitstop and what it can do visit:
http://www.enfocus.com/product.php?id=855

To learn more about how wonderful Mission Stream is for our clients, call us for a consultation at 613.288.2885.

 

2010 Calendars are here!

Our new calendars for 2010 are now here, with new themes and images!

These calendars are printed on demand, so we can change the months for you too! Why have a calendar starting at January if it’s already May? Call us if you want to create your own using our template. Pricing starts at $20 each, but the more you order the less per unit, all the way down to $4.50 per unit at high quantities. Send us your photos, print off some for family, clients or just to show off your photography.  Available all year.

Here are pictures of the front covers of the 2010 calendars:

Windows

Animals

Vintage Cars

Clocks

Hewn Stone