Why You Should Know The Size of Your Printers Press

Printing Press Sizes and Why It Matters.

What is a Full size printing press?

A full size printing press is one that is capable of printing up to a 28"x40" printed sheet. It will also print sheet sizes smaller than that but 28"x40" is the maximum size. This size press is the most popular size and is made for medium to longer run quantity print jobs. There are larger printing press sizes than even this but there are not that many around. The full size press will take two people to operate and have become less popular as final end user quantities have decreased in the last 10 years.

Manufacturers of some of these presses are: Heidelberg, Komori, Mitsubishi and others.

What is a Half Size Press?

Printers talk in weird terms sometimes. The term half size press represents a press that will feed a 20" x 28" sheet or smaller. It is called half size because a full size press feeds 28"x40" sheet.

Half size presses have increased in popularity as quantities have decreased that final customers are ordering. It takes one person to run versus two on a full size press. You have less makeready waste and plates are less expensive. This gives half size presses an advantage in doing short run brochures, flyers and other printed materials.

Of course, the press manufacturers then came up with small format presses(14"x20") to compete with the half size presses. Digital presses also compete with both the small format and the half size. In the printing business every press fills a niche. Make sure the printer you are using has the right press to fit the right quantity. Many printers have multiple size presses to fit a wide range of quantity needs.

What is a Small Format Press?

A Small Format press is a printing press that feeds a 14"x20" press sheet and is made for the short quantity market for printed products such as: Postcards, Brochures, Flyers, etc. A short run for us is defined as more than say 250 press sheets but less than 10,000 press sheets. I say press sheets because you may have multiple up of a postcard that you are doing 20,000 of but you may only have say 5000 press sheets.

The Small Format press popularity grew as order quantities have decreased. Many different press manufacturers manufacture these presses: Heidelberg, Komori, Ryobi and others. This press only takes one operator and makeready waste and materials will cost less than a full size or half size press.

You would not want to do real long runs on Small Format presses. Let's say you are doing 100,000 postcards and you can get 4-up on a small format press versus 16 up on a full size press the per unit price in higher quantities will be less with the full size press.

Buzz Tatom is the owner of The Odee Company Dallas Printing & Promotional Product Company, One stop help for your printing and promotional product needs. The Odee Company is located in Dallas, Tx and was started in 1923. We do both offset & digital printing as well as mailing and fulfillment services. We also offer a free resource site The best resource guide for printing and promotional products on the web.