Printer's Devil

In 2002, we married McNaughton & Gunn, a short-run (500 to 5,000 copies) printer in that hot bed of short-run printing, Ann Arbor, actually, Saline, Michigan. Before that we'd had a long relationship with Publishers Press, in Salt Lake City, but they went out of business.

We'd love to print in the Bay Area or somewhere else in California, but the unions and real estate prices make it impossible for local printers to compete on price.

And then McNaughton began to mess up. Two issues in a row.

So, on the recommendation of a colleague, we went with Central Plains Book Manufacturing Co. in Winfield, Kansas. Their quote was particularly attractive, and, on their website, they seemed to be hardworking, cornfed folks who would take pride in their craftsmanship.

But they gave us a paper that had less bite and less opacity than we had asked for; they trimmed the cover 3/16ths too much (look at the top and you'll see how skimpy the margin is); they didn't center the text on the spine (which can only be done after the thickness of the book has been established); they coated a big bunch of covers with a varnish instead of the UV treatment we'd asked for (all the subscribers got the UV cover; the bookstores got the varnish); and lots of the covers were blotchy.

If they had said, "We made a mistake, several mistakes, sorry," we would have said, "Mistakes happen. Let's try not to make the same ones next time."

But they tried to put the blame on the trucker, etc.

So we're sending the Winter issue to McNaughton this afternoon. Better the devil you know.