What about those PE (zip-lock) bags?

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Permalink Reply by mckibillo on March 29, 2008 at 8:08pm

I'm curious about this as well.

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Permalink Reply by Sonicscape Jun on March 30, 2008 at 6:05am

I think it all depends on the amount you're intending to produce. If you're going to do about a hundred or less, there's no point in automating the process.

Buy a batch of plastic sleeves, print your own card "headers" and attach to them yourself, shouldnt take more than a few hours of work.

There's no factory or producer likely to do such a small run for a reasonable price.

If you're going for thousands, then that's a different story :)

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Permalink Reply by brainjar on March 30, 2008 at 6:13am

That's exactly the point.. what will you do if you produce a batch with 500 or 1000 pieces - it's not that many, but is it enough? Of course i know that eg. Sjors will have to do them manually if he produces limited runs for his badgers, but where is the breaking point? And which companies can do them for smaller editions?

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Permalink Reply by Sonicscape Jun on March 30, 2008 at 6:48am

hmm.. I guess the breaking point is when you decide that your time spent doing other things could earn you more cash instead.

Well, China and Thailand! :D

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Permalink Reply by brainjar on March 30, 2008 at 6:58am

Well, as I'm an economist and not a designer i know exactly what we're talking about. ;)

I'm just curious how some produce their limited editions, seems to me that many designers set their heart on small editions and invest a lot of time doing so. Makes me wonder how cheap some stuff is being sold at their websites.

Still waiting for some field reports from those who do it tho.. =)

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Permalink Reply by Sonicscape Jun on March 30, 2008 at 7:04am

Okay :D if you do find out, do share it with me! I'm going to go into the vinyl industry with a partner very soon... So I've been doing research into the area of mass production.

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Permalink Reply by Matt Hawkins on March 30, 2008 at 8:35am

For Comic Monkey I just bought bags from a website Nicebunny clued me in on www.clearbags.com, they have a million different sizes. I also bought backing board from them. I just hand cut the header card, which I just made of card stock on a color printer and stapled 'em together myself.

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Permalink Reply by brainjar on March 30, 2008 at 8:58am

Thanks for the info. Doing the comic monkey by yourself probably took some time. Or did you spend "quality time" with your wife in front of the TV while having the two of you maintaining your own "co-production"? ;)

The thing why I'm interested in this kind of production is, that by giving even a small edition (does not matter if it's papertoys or something else) a "professional look" people will perceive a product like that immediately in a very different way. And of course I'm aware that part of the time spent on doing it has to be written off as advertizing yourself - so of course it's not possible to put an exact price tag on the time spent on those.
On a personal note this just makes me want to buy more of those small editions, knowing the work put in.

PS: Matt, you should read comments in your own blog more often. :P

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Permalink Reply by Castleforte on March 30, 2008 at 11:08am

Ha, that's funny. That's how I do it... quality time with the wife, in front of the tv, while she helps me cut and then I build.

And yes, as Matt said, ClearBags.com is the place to go. Sorry, I didn't see this post until now. Another great resource, for inkjet papers and inks is InkJetArt.com

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