Recommendations for print houses needed

Looking for good online print houses for 4/4 brochures, quantity only 1000. Quality a must, ontime critical, cost is flexible.

i've used copycraft a few times with pretty good results. had a business card that we weren't happy with the printing on (as we hadn't gotten a proof) and they reprinted for us so that was a plus for them. i'd say they're solid, just get a proof if you have time.

chris

Why does it have to be online? Why not start a relationship with someone local (if you live in an area where there are printshops)? Or even if you live an hour or so away, just have them Fed-Ex a proof or whatever. I personally don't see the attraction to an online printshop and am wondering what it is. There is quite a range with printshops and prices, so you can have an arsenal of different shops for different jobs, pending on cost/quality.

Personally, there is no way I am going to trust [email]someguy@someprintshop.some[/email]where over someone I can meet and talk to and build a relationship with thats close by. Plus, you can ensure you will get the product you want. There's a lot to discuss with a printer, especially if you say quality is a must...

Im curious why you would want an online printer? Especially for a brochure. Id like to see a press sheet.

So...did you find any great online shops? For future reference and such.

i totally agree with the previous post ... its one thing to have a local guy who has online features so u can have ur stuff posted for him/her to come into work in the morning and take a look at it while u slave at it till 3am in the morning. but im a bit hesitant to actually have someone online living in a sweat box do my printing for me LOL.

the thing about online customer relationships is just that, there is none. id like to look at samples and other stuff before actually giving the person a go-ahead.

now if u lived in a town that had nothing of the sort and u had to drive about 3+ hours to get ur stuff done then yeah maybe having an online person is a good resort but even then id visit the shop that was far away and have them get u on an online plan or something where u could send them emails and have them carry out ur instructions.

seems odd is all but convenience is a good thing in some ways.

Cheers
MEL

i think that depends on the online shop, there definitely are places you can build a relationship. with copycraft, the place i mentioned earlier, the guy had e-mailed me saying thanks for the clean files and that he likes working with designers who knew what they were doing, and asked if i'd like to see some samples. i had the package the next day

chris

I've had brochures and business cards printed from psprint and didn't have any problems.

PsPrint

I'm having a hard time finding someone local who even wants to quote 1000 tri-fold brochures with a bleed. I guess it's not worth the setup time for them.

Online guys are (from my experience) MUCH more reasonable cost-wise, and are typically a 'local shop' somewhere who decided to expand online to generate more volume through these million dollar machines. Proofs are an issue, but local guys just want to do a 'digital proof' most of the time anyways--because they don't want to interrupt production to just do proofs... do I'm not sure the value of the proof anyways. I mean, I can print it on my own ink jet printer and look at it if I want. If they do make a 'real' proof--they want a major upcharge to do it. Now, if I was doing 100,000 brochures, I'd demand a proof, but it's hard to convince them for the small jobs.

Okay, I'm releasing the order to Copy Craft tomorrow, ~$1000 worth of printing... /me pees his pants from nerves! Good part is they're in Texas, and they guarantee satisfaction--they reprint for free if you don't like it. Bad part is, I don't have time for reprint, the client needs the brochure for a trade show a week from Thursday.