What is a crossover? A crossover is an image that crosses over the center-fold in a multiple page product, like a magazine, or catalog. Your printer will try to explain the difficulty involved in producing crossovers, but until you’ve been up-close-and-personal with a project  where the crossovers failed, you won’t completely understand.

Why is that a problem? This would be easier to explain if I were face-to-face with you, but since I’m not I’m going to attempt to lead you through a little demonstration.

1. Get a piece of paper, size doesn’t matter, but make sure you can fold it easily.
2. If your paper is the standard 8 1/2″X11″ fold it in half so it is now 5 1/2″X8 1/2″.
3. Keep the fold at the top and fold in half again to 4 1/4″X5 1/2″.
4. This particular fold would result in an 8 page form.
5. Now with the folded form, keeping the fold at the top, begin numbering the lower right hand corners–1 through 8.
6. Be sure to number both sides of the paper or you’ll only have 4 instead of 8. If you don’t get 8 you’ve missed something.
7. Open your sheet of paper.

Notice that on one side the page numbers are 1, 4, 5, and 8. On the other side the numbers are 2,3, 6, and 7. Now notice where the numbers are in relationship to one another. Numbers 2 and 3 are on opposite sides and so are 6 and 7. Are you with me so far?

Refold the paper along the original creases. Take a pair of scissors, or hand rip the folded top off. What you have is a little booklet with all of the pages numbered consecutively, but it wasn’t that way before you took of the top fold was it?  The only pages on the flat sheet that were next to each other were pages 4 and 5, which is what we call the center fold. The center fold is a breeze, but it is the other pages 2 & 3 and 6 & 7 that cause the problem. If the press operator is unable to make a near perfect color match from one side of the sheet to the other pages 2 & 3 for example when brought together for the final product will look very odd. One page could be more blue and the other more yellow. That would be an unfortunate look for a landscape, but a total disaster for a portrait. Color shifts are very visible in flesh tones.

If you look at the double-truck catalog spread example below you will notice a definite color shift in the background.

Assuming that this all made sense, what can a designer do about crossovers?

It’s not “the economy, stupid” it’s the market. Maybe the phrase should be it’s the market, stupid. Printing companies have been dropping like autumn leaves with no immediate end in sight. According to the NAPL, the future is looking “dim” (my word, not theirs). They expect that a minimum of 4,000 printers to as many as 10,000 will shut down over the next 10 years. Over the last 4 years we saw a decline of 4,800 plants with approximately 150,000 employees. Since 1994 we experienced a loss of over 11,000 plants.

What does all of this mean? It means that the current state of the economy, while rough, isn’t the real reason for the decline in the industry. That’s why I say it’s the market, stupid! Thanks to the Internet,the methods we have used in the past to communicate with one another are withering away. For example:

Newspapers: Major metropolitan newspapers have hit very hard times. Some have already closed shop and many more are about to. It doesn’t take a very clear crystal ball to see that those that continue to exist will be very different from the newspapers of yesteryear. Why? Craig’s List, and other free online classified services eroded the base revenues for the papers. Who would pay for something they can get free, and that has larger reach? Also, every newspaper now publishes their content online. You can do more on a web page than a print page–it’s more flexible. For example you can beef up your story with graphics and movies  on a web page. It’s also timely. Hot news can be displayed on the website within minutes, instead of waiting hours for the next edition to hit the streets. We have no patience.

Magazines: Reuters reports that, “Newsstand and retail sales of U.S. magazines fell 11 percent in the second half of 2008, with celebrity and women’s titles taking a hit as supermarket and drugstore shoppers cut back on spending.” Furthermore, “Fifty percent of all magazines are sold in supermarkets, and obviously those types of places took a major hit.” If the decline in single copy magazine sales is because of the economy, will we see a rebound when the recession ends? And more importantly, when will it end? Again looking through my rather murky crystal ball, I predict many titles disappearing, and those standing will see sharp decreases in readership. Printers relying on magazine printing will be hard hit.

Books: Booksellers report decreases, with the exception of Amazon Media who appears to be up. Amazon is invested deeply in electronics. The Kindle reader entirely eliminates the need for printing. Amazon has also benefited from third party sales (see my For Your Consideration Page on this blog). It is estimated that 1 in 3 books sold at Amazon is actually sold by a third party. Smarter marketing is bringing them more business. Borders reported a loss and announced they are trying to sell their international operations and may sell the whole chain.

Direct Mail Marketing: I was once told by Peter Harrison, a direct marketing expert who is now running Affiliate Crew an internet company, that “Everything that goes in the mail must be printed.” What happens when mail volume goes down? Think about it, banks and other financial organizations have gone paperless. You don’t mail in your bills anymore, you authorize payment on-line. Envelope printers have suffered because of this. Forms printers have also felt the effects. What about other direct mail campaigns? The US Postal Service keeps increasing rates as more and more direct mail companies discover other marketing avenues. The ones left in the game will  bear ever heavier a postage burdens. Once the cost of postage reaches the proverbial camel’s back, the direct mail business will be through. Kaput. What will the post office have to do then, personal letters? Even with my cloudy crystal ball it’s as easy as seeing the housing boom collapse. Really, who didn’t see it coming with overinflated prices, and interest rates at 1%?

Catalogs: I had trouble finding some figures for catalog printing, but I can tell you that the catalogs are pushing web sales more and more. If you think about it they face similar challenges to newspapers. You can just do more on-line to show off your product than you can in print. Why not video the item, particularly clothing, so you can see front, back, and side? Once holographic technology is here the public will insist on 3 dimensional views. It’s just around the corner.

Wedding Invitations & Announcements: I’ll admit that invitations and announcements have never accounted for a big slice of the printing pie, but those printers specializing in them have been hit hard. Why? It’s because people have access to paper options, graphic design programs, and digital printing. They create their own invitations with their own style and creativity.

NAPL also reports that only [are the] larger plants growing in number. Those printers without deep pockets will be swallowed by the others. It’s the law of the jungle. The downside is that more print industry employees will find themselves unemployed. What are their options in the new economy?

Like the dawning of the Industrial Age big changes are happening, but at a much faster pace. What will it be like when clouds in my dirty crystal ball clear? I just don’t know–do you?

What’s more important, state-of-the-art equipment or skilled operators? That was the subject of a discussion I had with a very successful printer over lunch. I’ve always maintained that quality products are produced by quality employees. Inexperienced press operators make mistakes that they are often unable to fix.

For example, my brother Dan Ruesch, a top graphic designer, told me a story of a press check he attended where the PMS color was dingy. It just didn’t pop they way it should. After the pressmen tried everything they could think of to fix it, Dan remembered encountering a similar problem once before. He recalled that the solution was to change the paper wrap on a water roller.  So, of course, he made the suggestion to check it. The pressmen were surprised. Most customers don’t even know that there are two basic sets of rollers in a press, water and ink, and here was a graphic designer recommending a mechanical solution to their problem. Wow.

They took the suggestion, checked the roller, and found out that the paper wrap did need to be changed.  It worked, and they were able to go on and happily complete the job producing a printed product that both the company and the designer were proud to show.

Why did I tell this story? I told it to show what experience can do. Dan couldn’t run a press if his life depended on it, neither could I for that matter, but Dan carried with him years of experience from attending press checks. He had encountered a similar problem before, and remembered how it was solved. The press operator, had not come up against this particular difficulty before and was stumped. Experience vs. inexperience? I vote for experience myself.

This is my slant on the experience issue, the printer, eating his salad, disagreed. He believed if you bought state-of-the-art equipment with as many fully-automated features as you could get, you wouldn’t have to pay the wages of journeymen press operators. So, he hired less-experienced operators, and supervised them with a journeyman. His thinking was that they could call the guy over with the experience when they got in a jam, otherwise smart presses would take care of most of the problems.

Did this approach work for him? You bet it did. He was able to grow his printing company into one of the most prosperous firms in the area. Before he reached the age of fifty he sold it off, and retired. Boy, am I jealous.

What was my experience printing with his  company, you might ask? I’ll tell you. Despite all the awards he had hanging on his walls, and their sales literature that claimed they were the finest craftsmen in town, whenever I took a job there, it seemed to have problems. Not necessarily huge problems. There were difficulties getting the color right and holding it. Sometimes the trim or folding was off. The proof provided by the pre-press department couldn’t be matched on press. They came up short on the quantity. Things like this that could be worked around, but if he had paid higher wages for more experienced employees, would he still have this many problems? I don’t think so.

So, why was his business so successful? I believe that most customers don’t know the difference between excellent quality and good quality. If you don’t know the difference you won’t be able to see it even when right in front of you. The best work comes from people who know they are trying to please an expert. When I attend a press check, I carry with me a lifetime of press experience. They know it and will always strive to do their very best. If an inexperienced customer comes to a press check, assuming that they even know to come, their lack of knowledge becomes quickly apparent and they can be jargoned into approving anything. Remember a press operator has a vested interest in getting through the press check and running the job, otherwise they might be called on the carpet for lack of productivity. The number of press impressions per hour is important and if their numbers are down they will hear about it. If down often enough they could even lose their jobs over it.

My point? If you want to get quality printing, but you are not experienced enough to get it, don’t go into the print shop alone. Take someone with you who is experienced, but is not connected to the printer in any way. Someone working for the printer, and that includes their sales reps, has to protect the company’s profits. Unprofitable employees are invited to hit the bricks.  An independant print broker like myself is looking for a win-win, and that win includes getting you the product you need and paid for.  Since I am not paid by the printer, except through discounts, I stand by your side, like a free attorney. Isn’t that comforting?