POD Card Printing, Maybe

[guildofblades]

Hi Everyone,

I know there was some discussion on this topic in the past so I thought I would follow up with a post regarding some possibilities.

The Guild of Blades may be setting up in a new commercial space and as a part of that venture, acquiring a couple more machines to round off what we already own. One of those new machines will be a state of the art laser copier/printer and another a computerized die cutter.

The two of those together potentially makes POD cards possible. Naturally we are excited about this because it means we can green light some of our own card game designs, but it also open the potential for providing this service to others.

Specs on the cards:

1) Paper stock would be a 12pt glossy two sided cover stock or a 150 pound index stock. Depends on which printer we buy and which stock we think will get us the closest to real playing card feel.

2) Full color, both sides. Though I guess we could do B&W too. Just not seeing the big demand there.

3) If this die cutting machine works out ok, we should get full bleed, uniformly cut cards.

4) These would NOT have a lamination or varnish flood or cover. I'm hoping the combination of the glossy stock and the sharp printing quality from the new machine will give it a glossy enough presentation. Any practical attempts at lamination doubles the material price and easily triples the labor.

5) Price would be $.06 a card in 9 or 18 card sets. Multiple sets could be sorted into decks and placed into some sort of bag for sorting.

6) People would be able to order in very small quantities. Like we might have a minimum order of just 10 decks or something like that.

7) I can't guarantee that I can provide boxes. I've got a standard white tuck box that we used here at the Guild and could probably sell people that. A standard deck of 54 cards will fit in it. Not sure how much more though. And is just a white box, no artwork whatsoever. I could probably provide people our "wrap template" and print the wraps, but not sure if that a packaging approach many people would want. You can get 3 card box wraps up on an 8.5" x 11" sheet.

Now, I have to lay hands on demos of both these machines in action before I can feel confident about this. And we would not likely accept any outside orders for cards until we got moved into our new digs and likely refined the production process on one of our own card game designs.

That all said, I wondering if anyone here would be interested in cards of this nature?

Ryan S. Johnson
Guild of Blades Publishing Group
http://www.guildofblades.com
http://www.1483online.com
http://www.thermopylae-online.com

[iago]

I would, though not super-soon -- for a future project.

[Peter Nordstrand]

Man would this be welcome! I'm bookmarking this page now!

[Vulpinoid]

Definitely Interested.

This opens up a whole heap of potential options.

V

[Jake Richmond]

I've been looking for a card printer for Sea Dracula. I would be very interested.

[guildofblades]

Well...

I got to see a demo of the die cutting machine on Friday. Seems it can do what I want it to do, but maintenance on the machine and slow processing speed might end up driving the cost up to $.07 per card. Total production output would seem to be limited to the speed of the die cutter, which is not particularly fast and the only way to speed things up faster would likely be to buy more than one machine. Ouch.

But its speed ought to be plenty enough to do the productions we need for the Guild and a certain amount of additional workload. After I get the machine and get an idea on what the real demand is, I would have to a call on that time to decide if more than one was necessary. You know how it is though, gotta start small at first.

Ryan S. Johnson
Guild of Blades Publishing Group
http://www.guildofblades.com
http://www.1483online.com
http://www.thermopylae-online.com

[mindwanders]

Did you decide to go ahead with the purchase?

I've been thinking about it for a while and I have a project that will need POD cards at some point over the next six months, so I'm certailnly interested.

[guildofblades]

Hi,

Yep, saw the die cutting machine and the xerox printer we would be using. Both work great. We haven't bought them yet, but that's mainly just a personal life timing issue. We'll be doing our POD operations from a new retail store front we'll be running for the company, using a blending of a game store and a Kinkos as a business model. I'm spearheading the project and I know retail stores require a LOT of time dedication to make successful, especially in the beginning, so I have to wait to start the store build out until my wife's schedule will allow for it.

Should be soon though.

Ryan S. Johnson
Guild of Blades Publishing Group
http://www.guildofblades.com
http://www.1483online.com
http://www.ms-crm-consulting.com

[mindwanders]

No probs, I'm not in a hurry.

I just wanted to check this was still a potential option.

[Raymond Caleatry]

Hi,

I have already approached you about using your POD card printer when you get it.  I have another question.  My game involves the creation of a character deck, that is highly customisable, and hence it is next to impossible to print all the combinations of all the cards.  I have written a program that allows the players to create and manage their decks, but for my games i would be thinking of getting a more professional feel. 

My question... would it be possible to order say 6 decks of 50-60 cards where all the cards are different?  This is enough for the initial decks of the GM and players.  At under 5$ per deck i feel that it would be a nice addition to the game to have properly printed game cards, and that players will not mind the cost or the wait.

Ray

[guildofblades]

>>My question... would it be possible to order say 6 decks of 50-60 cards where all the cards are different?  This is enough for the initial decks of the GM and players.  At under 5$ per deck i feel that it would be a nice addition to the game to have properly printed game cards, and that players will not mind the cost or the wait.<<

let me ask for a little clarification and also give a little clarification.

Our minimum print run will be 10 units per deck/pack. So we're not doing true POD. Its just not efficient enough. We will do drop ship, but that means someone will have us print 10-50 units and warehouse them, shipping them out as directed.

If you have 6 different decks, all with different cards, that's totally fine. Though each deck will need to have a print run of 10 units or more. If two or more of these decks get grouped together for packaging, well, we'll have to discuss that with you. We have a box for a 2 deck started that we can use. Anything larger than that...it will depend. Maybe we can do it, maybe we simply ship completed decks back to you and you handle boxing them on your end. Maybe if you want us to do drop ship but need packaging we can't provide that you are able to source elsewhere, then you ship us a on hands quantity of that packaging. We'll be pretty flexible. I know everyone's needs are different and I would prefer to see more uniqueness from our clients than try to shoehorn everyone into a very limited set of options.

We list pricing by card just to get an easy grasp on pricing, but really we have to price by groups of 9 cards because we print 9 cards to a sheet. Printing less than 9 cards to a given sheet still ends up costing the same as printing 9 cards, so on your end your most cost effective per card counts will be in groups of 9. 9/18/27/36/45/54/63 etc.

Ryan S. Johnson
Guild of Blades Publishing Group
http://www.guildofblades.com
http://www.1483online.com
http://www.thermopylae-online.com