5 Reasons Paper is Here to Stay

Image courtesy of www.neenahpaper.com

The world may be changing, but paper is here to stay.

Paper sometimes gets a bad rep.  We've all heard things like "Save a tree..." and "Consider the environment before printing..."  But what a lot of people don't understand is that not only is paper an effective and affordable tool, its also made from a renewable resource - a resource that's essential to our environment and ecosystem.

1. Paper Grows Trees. Trees are the primary raw material for making paper.  We depend on trees to live.  They filter the water we drink and the air we breathe.  Most forestland in the U.S. is privately owned.  These landowners must be able to earn a living from growing trees, or the trees may be cut down to make way for farmland or real estate.  In fact, the U.S. Forest Service estimates that 12 millions acres of forest in the U.S. will be lost to suburban real estate development between 1991-2020 (http://us.fsc.org/).  Higher demand for paper and paper-related products will cause more trees to be planted and a better environment for generations to come.

2. Paper is a Renewable Resource. Did you know that the U.S. Forest Products Industry generates more renewable energy than all the solar, wind and geothermal energy combined? (http://www.afandpa.org/)  Thanks to today's technologies, close to 100% of a tree is used after harvesting.  And, for every one tree harvested in the U.S. three more trees are planted. (AF&PA)  This makes trees one of our most renewable resources.

3. Paper is Personal.  Here's a great resource from Domtar Paper (one of our paper suppliers) with some  fun facts about paper and people.  Paper is personal.  It's something we can hold in our hands and engage with.  Check out this cool video on the paperbecause website: http://www.paperbecause.com/media/paper---essential-for-life-s-big-moments-

4. Paper is Effective. Although digital technology has added versatility to marketing and communication, paper still remains an effective tool.  Direct mail gives advertisers a 13-1 return.  51% of consumers prefer personal mail.  (http://www.cmocouncil.org/index.asp)  Check out this cool website that brings to light some little-known facts about paper effectiveness: http://www.doyouknowthefacts.com/

5. Paper is Affordable.  Paper is sold in many sizes, weights and colors.  You can buy as much or as little as you need when you need it.  At DigiCOPY, we stock and special order paper from some of the most well-known paper manufacturers in the business:  Neenah Paper, Domtar and International Paper.  Check out dcopy.net to view our in-stock papers and get more information about getting affordable paper for your business or personal use.

A gift, meaningful and memorable.

I have a pretty big immediate family.  As the years have gone by and some of my siblings have gotten married, I cherish the holiday season more and more.  It's a time when we can all gather together, laugh, play games, and give thanks for all the blessings we've been given.  It's a rare event indeed that all of my siblings and their families are home at the same time.  And as I've gotten older, the gifts that we give each other at Christmas time have been less and less of a focal point.

Now, I love giving gifts, so I'm not trying to diminish the tradition.  I know many people who thrive on the shopping lists, planning, and deals on Black Friday.  On the other hand, I hear many people say each year that they are tired of giving people things they don't need, and I can understand that.  I've certainly given my fair share of gifts that never got used or were simply forgotten.  But when I think back on some of the most meaningful gifts I've ever given at Christmas time, they were always something I made or involved memories.

My mom loves having a calendar in her house on the kitchen wall.  It's hung in the same spot every year.  Last Christmas I decided it would be a good idea to print a photo calendar for her with all of our birthdays and anniversaries on it.  After all, I had been working at DigiCOPY for four and a half years and helped many customers print calendars as gifts.  So, I gave it a try.

Well, my oldest brother was just as enthralled with the calendar as my mom was, and already has commissioned me to make one for his family this year.  And, something tells me my mom will keep her 2012 calendar even long after the year's end.

There's certainly something to be said about gifts that can be hung on a wall for the whole family to enjoy.  I know many people struggle with what to give a certain friend or family member.  Instead of buying something they may not need, take the extra time this holiday season to gather some photos and print a gift that's sure to be meaningful and memorable.

You can check out our gift ideas and designs at dcopy.net or stop by one of our locations.  Happy gift-giving!

Powerful Marketing Tips for your Business

You don't have to spend a fortune to spread the word about your products and services.  Instead, come up with a strategy to reach new potential customers so you can focus your time and resources.  Here are a few suggestions to get started:

1. Mail a special offer to potential customers.  Paper is effective!  Research shows that more people would prefer receiving a printed mailer rather than an email offer.  Printed materials are more likely to get you noticed and generate a response.  Every Door Direct Mail (through USPS) is a great new way to send your mailers to a targeted audience.  Contact any of our locations for assistance with your design, printing options, and prep for mailing.
2. Include a flyer or brochure with your monthly statements and mailings.  If you're already sending out mailings, include a flyer or brochure that outlines your products and services.  You might be surprised which customers show interest in a service they didn't know you provided.
3. Engage your fans in social media.  Social media (Facebook, Twitter, Linked In, etc.) is becoming an ever-increasing avenue for communication between businesses and their customers.  It's not a question of whether our not your company does social media, but how well you do it.  There are tons of resources and information on the internet to help you get started.  Lykd.it and EasyPromos are a couple tools you can use to generate coupons for fans who like your facebook page.
4. Diversify.  The way we do business is constantly changing.  So should your marketing strategies.  Although you may have some strategies that continue to prove successful, it's also good to try different ways of getting your message out to the public.
5. Get Involved.  Hopefully, one of the main focuses of your business is to serve your customers.  Those customers make up the communities in which your business exists.  Make an effort to get involved in local fundraisers and events.  Supporting these events with your participation and donations from your company is a great way to build relationships.

For more ideas, check out Ten Powerful Marketing Tips for the Small Business. In this article, Ann Marie Rubertone outlines some great ways to broaden your audience that don't require lots of extra dollars.

Shedding some light pt. 2

In an effort to help bridge the lingo gap between us and our customers, we have been working to inform and educate through our website and blog.  As an add-on to our previous blog article, here are some additional printing and paper terms that might be helpful for you to know.

Proportional: When reducing or enlarging, the ratio relationship between the original document size and finished document size.  Two document sizes are proportional when a percentage of increase is applied and both width and height scale to match the desired finished document size.  See example below:

Paper Grades:
Text: Fine, high-quality uncoated papers.  Typically, they are made in various colors, with numerous textures and a variety of surface finishes.  Text papers are made from high-grade bleached wood pulp, cotten fibers, or tree-free pulp such as bamboo.
Index: A stiff, inexpensive paper with a smooth finish.  The high bulk but low weight of this paper makes it a popular choice for business reply cards.
Cover: A wide variety of fairly heavy plain or embellished papers, which are used as covers for books, catalogs, brochures, pamphlets, etc.  Good folding qualities, printability, and durability characterize it.
Coated: Term that applies to paper which has a special coating applied to its surface.  Coated stock is popular for business cards and book covers.

Paper Weights: Papers are often assigned a weight in pounds.  These weights are always based on how much a ream (500 sheets) of paper weighs when cut to the standard basis size.  Each paper grade (text, index, cover, coated) has its own basis size.  For example, the standard basis size for 20# (pound) paper is 17"x22", so a ream of 500 sheets in that size weighs 20 pounds.  These weights, therefore, do not necessarily refer to the thickness of each sheet of paper.  The paper caliper gives a more accurate definition of sheet thickness.

Caliper: The thickness of any sheet of paper, measuring by a micrometer gauge.  Often expressed in points, each being 1/100 inch.

Paper Grain:  The direction in which most of the paper fibers lie, determined during the paper-marking process.  Paper is identified as either grain short (grain is parallel to paper's short side) or grain long (grain is parallel to the paper's long side), depending on how the paper is cut.

Stock: A term for unprinted paper.

Collate: Pages printed in the proper page sequence (the pages of a report, the sheets of a book, or the pages of several sets of copies, etc.)  In contrast, pages that are not printed in sequential order are termed uncollated.

Margin & Gutters: Margins are the distance of white space between the edge of a printed page and the text or graphics on that page.  Gutters are the distance between columns on a page.

Multiple-Up: Smaller printed elements can be set multiple-up when more than one element can fit on a page.  For example, business cards (which are 3.5"x2") can be printed 10up on a Letter size sheet (8.5"x11")  This decreases cost for both the printer and the customer.

Variable Data Printing: Allows for custom text and graphics (pulled from a spreadsheet of information) to be printed on each individual piece.  This allows for a custom message, custom imagery, and/or mailing addresses to be printed independently.  Variable data printing works great for postcards and mailers.

If you have any terms or techniques you'd like to know more about, please leave us a comment.  We are here to serve you both with print resources and print information.

Shedding some light

Have you ever walked into a print shop and heard terms like "bleed," "dpi" and "cmyk"?  Did the discussion leave you more confused than when you first arrived?  We know that because we work with printers everyday we tend to use our own lingo, so we'd like to shed some light on these terms and their definitions.  It's especially important to keep these in mind when creating your own documents at home and sending them to us to print.

Bleed: (or "Full Bleed") Any text, images, or colors that run off the trim edge of your final printed piece.  A full bleed file requires an extra 1/8" border all around for cutting purposes.  For example, a 4x6 postcard file would have a document size of 4.25x6.25.  A bleed is necessary because it is impossible for a cutting blade to hit the exact same location on every page when cutting printed sheets in a stack.

No Bleed: If no text, images or background colors are extending to the time edge of your final printed piece.  A no bleed file requires at least a 1/8" white border all around.  Files can be printed with a "Fit to Printable Area" setting that will enforce an 1/8" white border when printed.

Resolution: (or "DPI") The term used to describe the number of dots, or pixels, per inch used to display an image or file.  Higher resolution means that more pixels are used to create the image, resulting in a crisper, cleaner image.  An image will print pixelated when its resolution is low, or the image is enlarged significantly resulting in loss of quality.  As a general guideline, 300 dpi is a sufficient resolution for most printed materials.

CMYK: Stands for Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black toner that is used in digital printers to create print on paper.  Combinations of these four colors are printed in tiny dots that when visually mixed together create various colors.  Digital files that are created for print should be in CMYK color mode.

RGB: Stands for three primary colors of light: Red, Green and Blue.  RGB is a color mode specific to computer monitors which use combinations of these three colors to achieve an image on screen.  It is usually not recommended that digital files created for print be in RGB color mode.

Pantone Color: Color process developed by Pantone that creates colors without dots.  Often referred to as spot or solid color, these swatches are created from a palette of 14 basic colors, each mixed according to its own unique ink mixing formula.  The pantone color process is common to printing presses and is often not a successful method of color matching when using digital technology.

Check back soon for more terms and helpful tips.

Reach Every Home, Every Address, Every Time.

The US Postal Service is embracing a simpler way to reach the masses with its new Every Door Direct Mail (EDDM) Service. You may have recently seen or heard a creative advertising campaign for the new program in which the USPS is coining the tag line, “Every home, every address, every time.”

Official USPS Chicken Commercial

Official USPS Theatre Commercial

EDDM utilizes an online portal that allows mailers to select by neighborhood, city, or zip code, as few as 200 or, as many as 5,000 recipients per day, to receive their mailing. The current postage cost for the service is an incredibly low 14.5 cents per piece, making the service not only the most simplistic of its kind, but also the most affordable.

With multi-channel marketing technologies constantly evolving, lets face it; there is way less competition in the mail box than ever before!

According to Print in the Mix, a print media research division of Rochester Institute of Technology 

• Six out of 10 U.S. consumers surveyed say they “enjoy getting postal mail from brands about new products.”
• Across all key verticals – from financial and insurance to retail and personal care – direct mail is preferred over email by all respondents.
• Consumers report getting an emotional boost from receiving direct mail; 60% agree they “enjoy checking their postal mail boxes.”
•  Half of all respondents concur with the statement, “I pay more attention to information I receive by postal mail than if it was received by email.”

·          Six out of 10 (59%) enjoy receiving direct mail sent to their homes promoting new products, while 43% like receiving new product emails from brands. Note: Respondents could agree to one or both statements.

Click here for more marketing statistics from Print-in-the-mix.

Every door direct mail is a great marketing tool for anyone trying to get the word out about their product, service, or event. From do-it-yourself, local business owners, to marketing professionals that don’t want to pay the annual fee for a mailing permit, the co-workers at DigiCOPY can help you design, print & mail your next marketing piece. See the EDDM page on DigiCOPY’s website for more information about the services we offer.

For more information, and to register your business, visit usps.com/everydoordirectmail

A piece of the puzzle.

Ruth Kaufman, a Chicago author and actress, describes 'puzzle writing' as a sure fire way to write a book.
"Writing a book is like doing a jigsaw puzzle. You have to arrange a lot of pieces–characters, plot, setting, pace, sub-genre elements, dialogue, narrative, etc.–until they form a seamless whole." Read More

This is something we've considered recently.  We've had the privilege of working with several authors and small publishers over the years - seeing their popularity grow - watching them piece together new stories and ideas - helping them find ways to better their product.  And it's been fun to be one of the pieces in their puzzle.


As we've come to see, it's not just a matter of writing a killer story, but also producing a printed product that brings your story into the hands of your readers.  After all, that is the end goal of writing a book in the first place - to share it.


One of the core values of our business is long-term relationships.  Not just within our company, but with our surrounding communities and customers.  We'll be featuring some works of popular area authors and small publishers in our stores over the next few months.  Stop by one of our 8 locations to check out some of the cool ideas and products they've pieced together through the years.  And, check out book publishing resources on our website!