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Author Topic:   Printing the new Zzap!
Gribbly posted 14-03-2002 01:51 PM GMT   Click Here to See the Profile for Gribbly   Click Here to Email Gribbly  
Hello one and all!

First off, congratulations to one and all in getting the great new issue of Zzap off the ground.

I work in a publications / design team and part of my job is print buying, so I thought I would have a look at printing costs for the new Zzap!

I'd be quite keen to get a professionally printed copy of the new mag as I am sure a number of others would too.

I always knew it would be expensive, but thought I would have a look anyway. I'm also not sure what the interest in buying a copy is, especially at these prices, but have a look at the costs and let me know.

It's based on printing to A4 size, and I'm not sure what format you laid the artwork up at, so it might be that when it's trimmed it comes in somewhere a little smaller than the original Zzap magazines.

This, my friends is what it would cost to print. Remember, this is based on digital printing using an Indigo press, not litho, but digital printing standards are pretty good now.

If only 10 copies were printed, each copy would be £37 plus delivery (ouch).

If 50 copies were produced it would come down to £15 plus delivery.

If 100 copies were produced the unit cost would come down to about £12 per copy plus delivery.

Now, this is pretty expensive. At £12 it's not too bad, seeing as we probably all lash out £5 on magazines these days without thinking about it and this would be a new copy of Zzap, but if the the call was much less than 100, the unit cost is pretty well prohibitive.

It would be printed in 4 colours on 170gsm art paper, collated, trimmed and saddle stitched.

What do people think?

You might have already done this and decided it was not worth it, but I thought I would have a look at the costs.

If the interest is high, then I will do some more investigations into getting a better deal. It won't come much lower than this though unless we could somehow get a much bigger interest.

We'd also have to look at a fair safe way of getting the money together as I don't have £1000 to pay up front for it. Personally, I wouldn't want to spend any more than the £15 mark for an issue, this would need another 49 people who want to spend this on it.

Please note, these are cost prices, I am not adding anything or attempting to make any cash out of this idea.

Let me know...

Steve posted 14-03-2002 10:37 PM GMT     Click Here to See the Profile for Steve  Click Here to Email Steve     
count me in.
£15 aint that much to have a good quality Zzap 64 issue 107 in your hands. like you said, PC mags are around the £5-£6 mark every month.
(plus, i would get to see my artwork for the Remix 64 advert in all its glory)
CraigG posted 15-03-2002 11:44 AM GMT     Click Here to See the Profile for CraigG  Click Here to Email CraigG     
The artwork was laid out as A4, as per the old Zzap!s (well, prior to the outsized format).

*However*, as I've said previously, I've not idea whether the PDF is suitable for a professional print job. Firstly, none of it is in CMYK (it's all RGB, so you can print it on a home printer, which is what we anticipated happening most of the time*). Also, there is no bleed at all on the pages, including on much of the source file, so I couldn't do a 'bleed' version without a considerable amount more work.

I know I'm being a bit negative here, and it would be nice to get printed and bound copies, but it would be worth finding out if the file is usable before everyone's money gets spent! :)

I can answer any questions from a printer if need be.

As an aside, Iain also did some shopping, and his result was somewhat cheaper:

>>>
From artwork
A4
Self Cover
4 colour Digital
On 170gsm coated (matt or gloss)
Fold Stitch & Trim

36pp 100 copies £695.00
>>>

* And, yes I know home printers are mostly CMYK-based, but they usually still prefer RGB files to be sent to them.

Gribbly posted 15-03-2002 05:49 PM GMT     Click Here to See the Profile for Gribbly  Click Here to Email Gribbly     
Hello!

Yeah, better prices indeed. I should find out who that printer is for work!

As far as printing is concerned, RGB will be fine for digital printing, it would only really cause a problem if it was done by litho, they can make adjustments before running to get a good match anyway. Also, the bleeding isn't a huge problem, I had a chat with a printer I use a fair bit and he said that with careful trimming all it would mean is the printer could print it slightly undersize and trim which should provide a good result.

I've been off work as I had an operation recently so I haven't have access to all my print contacts. That's why I said if the interest was there I could do a bit more of an investigation, but to be honest the price Iain has got sounds very good. Do you know what digital machine they are using? Quality can vary hugely between printers and machines, whilst as I said before you can get excellent digital printing these days, you can also still get some goddam awful stuff too!

Still, at £7 to £8 a mag it's not bad (note I included VAT in my prices, you might have too, but remember most printers quote ex VAT) and it might just pull in enough people to make it viable when at £12 it could put people off.

I'm definitely in for a copy and am happy to help in any way I can regarding the printing. As I am not exactly famous on this site, I think if this does happen, pre-payment should go to someone like Iain or any of the main contributers to the magazine.

Let's just see what the need is...

Darwin posted 18-03-2002 11:18 PM GMT     Click Here to See the Profile for Darwin  Click Here to Email Darwin     
I would buy Zzap 107 at that price. Count me in!
CraigG posted 19-03-2002 10:21 AM GMT     Click Here to See the Profile for CraigG  Click Here to Email CraigG     
On a fairly serious level, I mentioned the whole printed Zzap!64 107 thing to Kim @ Lemon64 and he suggested that he might be happy to 'advertise' it on his site in order that the break-even point be fulfilled.

I guess it's a possibility. We estimate that at least 4,000 downloads of the hi-res have occurred, so maybe at least 100 would like a print-out, although, as we've said here, the price might be too high for many.

iain posted 20-03-2002 02:46 AM GMT     Click Here to See the Profile for iain  Click Here to Email iain     
As I said before (well maybe only to Mort!) but my main worry is putting in a lot of money to get issues printing and then being left with lots of issues which I can't sell (I still have 40+ t-shirts from the tfyatdt.com site in my drawer at home!)

But an option would be for people to order the magazine by credit card on my other site, so then we would know how many people are serious and can print the issues and mail them out and THEN charge the credit cards. If enough people don't put forward an order to make it viable, than I can just cancel all the orders.

I think this is the only way I can do it as it reduces the risk to me.

Of course if we get a lot of interest and do the print run, we can get some extras to sell at the next BIT as well.

Thoughts?

BIGGEST JIM posted 20-03-2002 07:39 AM GMT     Click Here to See the Profile for BIGGEST JIM  Click Here to Email BIGGEST JIM     
Hi,
I totally agree with Iain.
I wouldn't mind paying by credit card, and I wouldn't mind paying 10 bps for my issue as long as the print quality is OK.
I think we should make a list of people who are willing to purchase issue 107 this way and see if it makes sense.
Cheers
Rob/Biggest Jim
CraigG posted 20-03-2002 12:07 PM GMT     Click Here to See the Profile for CraigG  Click Here to Email CraigG     
Iain--that's the sort of thing I was thinking of anyway, not assuming someone would pay a huge wodge of cash and then 'hope'. My guess is that if it's a limited run of 100, they will get snapped up fairly fast, especially if they're all advertised on Lemon.
iain posted 21-03-2002 12:30 AM GMT     Click Here to See the Profile for iain  Click Here to Email iain     
We should advertise it as much as possible so we get a good amount of orders in a short time period. Considering how many hits Lemon gets, that should help us along a good bit.

Hopefully I'll get time to set it all up over the weekend and then give about a week or so to get the orders in (longer if they are slower I guess).

I'll also email the printer again to see if the price he gave me included vat or not.

The quality should be rather good and he's a mate of a mate so we shouldn't get messed around!

PaulEMoz posted 21-03-2002 03:09 PM GMT     Click Here to See the Profile for PaulEMoz  Click Here to Email PaulEMoz     
I'd love to get one. It's an historic achievement, and to be part of it was fantastic, so to have a permanent record would be brilliant.
Mort posted 21-03-2002 11:00 PM GMT     Click Here to See the Profile for Mort  Click Here to Email Mort     
Iain tried getting hold of my laser printed copy I showed him last weekend (eh Iain) so I know how much a "professionaly" printed copy would be valued by you all he he he. But I would also like to see a proper print run of the mag :-)

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