Greeting card business

[Macks]

Hi guys,

im planning on starting a small greeting cards business, im in need of inkjet printer (or laser if its cheap enough) thats reliable and cheap to run, not to mention has decent photo quality, id prefer something that i could use non-OEM ink with too minimize costs. The main issue is that it needs to be able to print borderless a5/a6 card. Im struggling to find a printer that will do this, if there is a workaround to this that doesnt involve too much messing around i'd like too hear it.

Thanks for helping me out.

 

[qwertydude]

You'll want something with a little more permanence than your run of the mill dye based photo printer. Even though the photo quality is better with dye and coated paper, on plain card stock you get better performance with pigments for not too great a hit in photo quality. The quality will at least match the printed commercial cards but won't have the special "embossed" look of the offset or intaglio prints some of the big name cards do. I suppose your cards will be customized which is one advantage over commercially available cards even without the embossed look.

With that being said for higher volume prints jobs you'll definitely want Epson's piezo heads for reliability. Then you can get a CISS for it. The Epson Workforce series would be a good candidate, it uses pigment inks and can be easily converted to CISS. Make sure you get the newest versions of the ARC chips for compatibility or for absolute certainty I know the button reset CISS's work. This would be the lowest cost solution that offers good quality printing and reliability for mid to high volume print jobs.

As for printing borderless. You can customize size by the millimeter in the Epson driver and as long as you select photo paper in the options you'll be able to specify borderless. The color might be a little shifted since you'll be using aftermarket inks and an odd paper setting so it's always a good idea to invest in a color profiler like profile prism. Then you should be all set.

 

[Macks]

Too be honest print quality in comparison too commercially printed cards wont be that much of an issue, because as you say ive got the personalized aspect, they just have to be decent. Sorry im not very clued up on printers, is a CISS a continuous ink system? are these easy too set up? i presume they save on costs? Will an epson definitely print border-less a5 and a6 as ive tried with a canon and i always seem to get a 1cm white stripe on the left side of the card where nothing has been printed. Also do you have any recommendations in terms of printers? something around the 100 mark that would suffice.

Thanks for your help again.

 

[qwertydude]

Although it's not a preset here I have to assume you're in Europe, I see by the pound most likely in the UK somewhere, so the printers will be setup specifically for metric. On my American Epson I have as an option A2, A3, A4, and A6 and by selecting borderless in the options it will print the full size but for some reason not A5 but this is usually remedied by simply specifying a user defined slightly larger bordered size and using your A5 paper. It'll automatically do borderless. You might need a custom template in whatever card making program you use but that's easy enough.

CISS is the continuous ink system. It's a good option for heavy users who don't want to be bothered with constantly refilling. Setup is pretty easy. Mostly just plug and play. At most you might have to prime them but that's easy to do also. But like I said any Epson Workforce, it really depends if you want an all in one or a single function printer, either would be the least expensive print option, only Epson is the brand to use CISS with since others have trouble with the ink feed system.

 

[Macks]

Im in europe yes, so any epson workforce i buy should have the a5/a6 option on it, i was going to create the cards in photoshop and print them directly from there..

 

[Anthony]

[..]

On my American Epson I have as an option A2, A3, A4, and A6 and by selecting borderless in the options it will print the full size but for some reason not A5

[..]

I currently have a 1400 here in the UK and I cannot see an A5 paper size either. In fact I was looking for one just yesterday and resorted to a custom size setting to achieve an A5 sized print.

Anthony.

 

[Macks]

[..]

On my American Epson I have as an option A2, A3, A4, and A6 and by selecting borderless in the options it will print the full size but for some reason not A5

[..]

I currently have a 1400 here in the UK and I cannot see an A5 paper size either. In fact I was looking for one just yesterday and resorted to a custom size setting to achieve an A5 sized print.

Anthony.

were you able to get this custom size setting within the epson software itself? or was it alot of hassle using other programs..