Turn around time for me depends on the individual job and how busy I already am, a week to two weeks is my usual quote. But as a general rule, I estimate how long it’s going to take me based on previous jobs (factoring things like set up and clean up time and how many prints I can do on average in an hour, time its going to take to make plates and wither I have the paper on hand of if it will need to be ordered etc.) and then I double it. That way if something goes wrong,  I get a migraine or my kid gets sick I don’t miss the deadline. If you get it done before you said you would the client will not complain but they certainly will if you miss the deadline. For wedding jobs it can be helpful to do the envelopes first, that way they can begin addressing them while you finish off the rest of the order. Also I am clear with the client that the clock doesn’t start until the final design has been approved, which often helps to speed things up.

Well I think of it in these terms, I want some impression to show on the front without it making the back of the card look ugly.

Often you need to educate your client about the process, part of what you are selling with letterpress is that it the item is hand made and your taking the time to tell them about how it’s done helps emphases this. When we are talking papers, design etc. I tell clients that what paper you use really makes a difference on how much of an impression you can get, softer cottony, thicker paper allows for more impression than hard, thin stock – so if that blue paper they love only comes in 80lb stock they will be trading color for level of impression. There is a limit to how much impression you can get from a press which varies depending on the presses size and also in the amount of plate area you are trying to print – you are going to get a stronger look of impression with just a line of type as apposed to a paragraph of it (walk on grass in tennis shoes and you get a little dent, wear heels and you are going to sink in.) Also that deeper impression will thicken and some ways distort the type a little bit – which is to say if they picked a delicate looking typeface then pounding the crap out of it is going to take away from that. There are trade offs to be made, getting the client to understand this and to make some choices really helps with being able to deliver a product everyone is happy with.

An alternative to classes might be to find someone versed in Quickbooks to do the set up for you and then show you how to use it – I have an out of work friend I was thinking of paying to do this for me. While I hate the title ?Quickbooks for Dummies? also does get good ratings on Amazon.

After my first post on this discussion I did a bit more looking around, but didn’t like the fact that the online options seemed to have you over a barrel and could easily change the terms on you like what happened to you with Freshbooks. One problem with buying Quickbooks seems to be that they have a built in obsolescence at least according to the complaints I read on Amazon but if you factor in how long it works before you need to upgrade it is still cheaper than paying the monthly fees for the online options.

 

Uline might have the boxes you are looking for ~

The reply probably comes too late, but it seems like most people use Dover clip art books ~

I have been struggling with the same sort of  thing – creating my invoices in Illustrator and keeping lots of paper files – I was considering buying a copy of Quick Books. Quick Books sells for just under $150 at MacMall.com, so that;s approximately 16 months worth of Outright. Since no one else has chimed in here I think I’ll try posting a query about Quick Books and maybe you and I will both get more answers that way ~

Sorry to hear about your disaster. Oh hot sunny days at outdoor fairs I’ve had some wrinkling / sagging with my clear bags and they were the standard not biodegradable kind. (Also my lino cut cards which have a lot of ink on them sweat!) I think Swan Island Press may not send out their cards in bags, atleast they seem to be displayed without them.

I just talked to Fritz at NA Graphics a little while ago and I think the problem was that he was sick for a while and had others who were less attentive dealing with his business while he was gone. He’s an older guy, so my inclination was to cut him slack on this (I was waiting on an order too). Always before this my stuff has arrived in decent time and Fritz is a great repository of information on Vandercooks – he’s been very helpful about giving me info when I’ve called and been trying to diagnosis a problem.

I ask for a deposit of half the job’s fee up front before I begin work and I have all my local clients come to my studio to pick up the finished job. That way I get the remainder of the balance from them before the goods leave the studio and don’t have to do any waiting. If it’s a rush job, and the client will be picking it up from me, I will occasionally skip the deposit and get the full amount at the end.As for dead-beats, I find being cheerful and unfailingly polite while at the same time relentless in my contacting of them, email, phone calls, snail mail, all combined and done over and over again, works pretty well at getting them to pay up. It has this Norm Bates feel about it that seems to get to them….

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