Songbook printing

[trelynda]

I am looking to print my songbooks, spiral bound. Who do you suggest? kinkos, staples?

[kod]

Originally Posted by trelynda

I am looking to print my songbooks, spiral bound. Who do you suggest? kinkos, staples?

In my area, I use Office Depot mainly because I get coupons for reduced printing costs.

I keep my songbook in Excel (simply because I started this way years ago, before I went to Hoster). I have six books with ~320 pages per book (~1900 pages total). I put "By Song & By Artist" in the same book (3" Binder Notebooks).

I don't do spiral bound. I use sheet protectors to keep them clean/dry!

I only have my books printed professionally once a year. I add "New" songs in the front of the book using a different color paper and print these myself.

[SteveD]

I would stay away from Office Depot or Kinkos, try small printing shops and get quotes first. I get my books printed for around $20 for a songs by artist book and $23 for songs by title books. My current library is around 39,000 songs. We use the dual column print feature and spiral bind them. This includes the color covers that are laminated.

[kod]

Originally Posted by SteveD

I would stay away from Office Depot or Kinkos, try small printing shops and get quotes first. I get my books printed for around $20 for a songs by artist book and $23 for songs by title books. My current library is around 39,000 songs. We use the dual column print feature and spiral bind them. This includes the color covers that are laminated.

I have tried that and nobody can (or has yet) beat Office Depot in my area!

Believe me I've tried...

[SteveD]

I just wanted to add that these spiral bound books really do hold up way better than I expected. I used 3 ring binders with sheet protectors and constantly battled to keep them in order as the binders do tend to let sheets slip out. I put a small cable tie on each end to make sure the spiral binder doesn't come undone. The cost is way cheaper than three ring binders with sheet protectors.

These spiral bound books easily last about three years before you need to replace them. We normally print 6 by artist and 2 by song title for each of our systems. We normally print two new books per system per year and put a revision date on each new book. If someone asks for new songs we give them the newest books.

Maintaining 3 ring binder books is just something our company doesn't have time for, we do 29 scheduled shows a week, have 9 systems with 8 books for each system. These books are also 1/3rd the thickness of a 3 ring binder. Think about it, for each page in your book you have two layers of plastic and one layer of paper. You have to pay for each sheet protector and the upkeep to upgrade them each time you redo your books is seriously time consuming. You have to remove all the old pages and replace them with the new pages. My kids hated helping me do this to 72 books every year. Just the time to do this update is unbelievable. Way more cost effective to let your printer do this for you by printing new inexpensive books.

Believe me I have done both and was very, very, skeptical about how spiral bound books would hold up versus sheet protectors in 3 ring binders.

We made the switch over four years ago and I have never regretted it. I was talked into trying this by a friend of mine who owns a Karaoke Co. but who is a former printer.

My advice is to just try it. Just make sure you shop it around and don't feel afraid to go back to some of these printing shops and negotiate to get the best deal. We also use an Ariba Case that easily holds up to ten books and a pencil case for song slips and pencils. We stagger each book (book oriented with the spiral on the outside, next book with spiral on the opposite end) so the spirals don't get caught on each other.

[kod]

Originally Posted by SteveD

I just wanted to add that these spiral bound books really do hold up way better than I expected. I used 3 ring binders with sheet protectors and constantly battled to keep them in order as the binders do tend to let sheets slip out. I put a small cable tie on each end to make sure the spiral binder doesn't come undone. The cost is way cheaper than three ring binders with sheet protectors.

These spiral bound books easily last about three years before you need to replace them. We normally print 6 by artist and 2 by song title for each of our systems. We normally print two new books per system per year and put a revision date on each new book. If someone asks for new songs we give them the newest books.

Maintaining 3 ring binder books is just something our company doesn't have time for, we do 29 scheduled shows a week, have 9 systems with 8 books for each system. These books are also 1/3rd the thickness of a 3 ring binder. Think about it, for each page in your book you have two layers of plastic and one layer of paper. You have to pay for each sheet protector and the upkeep to upgrade them each time you redo your books is seriously time consuming. You have to remove all the old pages and replace them with the new pages. My kids hated helping me do this to 72 books every year. Just the time to do this update is unbelievable. Way more cost effective to let your printer do this for you by printing new inexpensive books.

Believe me I have done both and was very, very, skeptical about how spiral bound books would hold up versus sheet protectors in 3 ring binders.

We made the switch over four years ago and I have never regretted it. I was talked into trying this by a friend of mine who owns a Karaoke Co. but who is a former printer.

My advice is to just try it. Just make sure you shop it around and don't feel afraid to go back to some of these printing shops and negotiate to get the best deal. We also use an Ariba Case that easily holds up to ten books and a pencil case for song slips and pencils. We stagger each book (book oriented with the spiral on the outside, next book with spiral on the opposite end) so the spirals don't get caught on each other.

Not everybody has 72 books to keep up...

My way is STILL the cheapest and more practical for me!!!