The United States Business Card Company

“Location:

New York City Weekend Flea Markets (Indoor/Outdoor)

Saturday:
268 Mulberry St. (indoors, year round) between Houston & Prince St.
11:00am – 7:00pm

Sunday:
I.S. 44 Flea Market, 77th St. & Columbus Ave (indoors, cold weather & rain, April 1st- Nov 1st)”

This sounds most promising. Too bad it doesn’t appear that others do this in the PNW.

From the FAQ:

Q. Well that’s great, but your machine can’t measure up to my laser printer. I’ve got state of the art pixels. What have you got?

A.How many times have you called that 800 number and waited forever to deal with the malfunctioning of your printer? My Platen Press has few moving part, requires a little bit of oil now and then, and has never needed a service call. As for your state of the art pixels, they aren’t as perfect as you think. Look at them up close and you can see that the little dots that make up your text gives it a greyish cast, Yuck! With foundry type, the ink is applied to solid metal, covering the entire surface of the implanted typeface within the press and then crushed into the paper leaving a sunken solid impression that you can actually feel with your fingers. No dots, no cloudiness, and a tactile feeling you can’t ever get with your printer.

Q. Well, Ok Mr. Bigshot Letterpress man. But I’ve got premium paper like Strathmore and Cranes that I can run through my printer. You can’t do that.

A. Yes I can, as well as printing even more! My platen press can print those difficult to print papers and card stocks such as breakfast cereal boxes, papyrus, cardboard, real wood, and that triple thick cardboard. Many commercial printers won’t even touch those. A platen press is especially useful for these specialty papers such as those handmade papers with the deckled edges often used for wedding invitations (And I can make those for you too!).

I’m liking this. No rate citations on his site, alas, and no biz card samples, so I don’t know about the inset or two-color.

Stern & Faye are in the Skagit Valley.

WoodWorks Press appears to specialize in poetry chapbooks and broadsides (and fine instruments). While a $45/year subscription will bring you a year’s output, “including obscure party favors,” I see no indication that Mr. Hunter takes on job type.

Hm, I wonder if ordering a rubber stamp with this design might be about as cost effective, for that matter. It certainly opens stocks for consideration.

I have also been operating on the untested assumption that it’s a bad idea to use inkjet-printed cards, based on the solubility of the inks. It occurs to me that I should test this thesis, and so I will, forthwith.