THE PRINTING DEPARTMENT

NEARLY all of the larger paper box manufacturers are operating their own printing departments. Many of the smaller paper box-making concerns are also operating private printing plants, and when managed efficiently, the printing department is a profitable investment for any paper box factory, large or small.

The writer knows of several large printing concerns, of New York City and Philadelphia, who are specializing in the production of wrappers and other printed matter for paper box manufacturers. All of these printing establishments are continually busy, and from all indications, are earning substantial profits on their work. In fact, it is certain that these printing concerns are making money on their specialty lines, for they have been in business for a long time; are paying their employes the standard scales of wages, and are keeping their plants in first class physical condition by installing new machines and labor-saving devices immediately as they are placed on the market. Now unless a printing firm is earning a fair margin of profit on all of its product, certainly it would not be in the financial position to do the things which have just been mentioned.

If a printing company can afford to operate a large plant, running almost exclusively on work for paper box manufactures, there is no reason why the box-makers themselves cannot make money by having their own printing plants. The writer, however, has heard some box manufacturers complain about not earning any profits from private printing plants, and in this article the writer will attempt to point out to the box-makers the ways and means of profitably conducting a printing department. With my eighteen years experience as a practical printer and executive, I feel that I am capable of offering information regarding the printing business which should prove helpful to paper box manufacturers in general.

EQUIPMENT SUGGESTED FOR A MEDIUM-SIZE PRINTING
DEPARTMENT

It is my intention to suggest the newest material and mechanical equipment for a printing plant rather than material and machines which are not quite up-to-date, and this will explain why I shall mention such things as steel composing-room furniture, and automatic feeders for platen presses.

A printing plant, equipped with the machines and materials mentioned in the foregoing, could be classed as ideal. It would be adapted to any kind of printing which may come to the paper box manufacturing plant. The 10 × 15 and 12 × 18 Chandler & Price presses, fitted with automatic feeders, would be capable of handling long runs of wrappers at high speed, while the Hartford (or John Thomson) press would be engaged on fine color work, embossing, etc., and the Pony cylinder press could be used for larger work, printing cartons, two or more wrappers together on one sheet, and so forth.

Steel composing-room equipment has been suggested because of its great durability and improved design, but hard-wood printers’ furniture, like that made by the Hamilton Manufacturing Company, of Two Rivers, Wis., and the Kramer Woodworking Company, of Philadelphia, will serve just as well as steel equipment in the average printing office. On pages Nos. 161 and 162 are illustrations, showing front and back views of the Tracy Type Cabinets (Hamilton Manufacturing Co.) which are very popular in many composing-rooms.

IMPOSING TABLES.

The new-style imposing tables are made from both steel and wood. Both the steel and wood imposing tables have planed steel tops. These tables come in various sizes, and they are made in different styles so far as the arrangement of drawers, galley-slides, letter boards, chase racks, and lock-up furniture is concerned. The following illustrations of a No. 4040 Hamilton Imposing table, made of hard-wood with a steel top, shows the back and front views of the table. Note the arrangement of the printers’ labor-saving wood furniture, letter-boards, galley shelves, chase rack and drawers:

The time-saving advantages of an imposing table of this design should be apparent to any intelligent person. With a table equipped like this one, with labor-saving furniture, letter-boards, etc., the imposition man can lock-up form after form without finding it necessary to walk away from the table for lock-up material. On the letter-boards are kept standing “live” forms ready for repeat orders. Hundreds of small, live jobs are also kept standing on the galleys. As the forms are locked up for the presses the chases are placed in the chase rack, and from there the pressman takes them.

TYPE EQUIPMENT

It would be impossible to specify type equipment which would be 100 per cent suitable for the printing department of a paper box plant, for the reason that the requirements of every printing department are different. It is safe, however, to install popular type faces like Lining Gothic, Caslon Old Style, Bodoni Bold, Caslon Bold, Cheltenham Bold, Goudy Bold, etc. Much of the label and carton work handled in the box-maker’s printing office is composed of heavy-face type, like Cheltenham Bold for example, and that is why the bold faces mentioned have been suggested. Both light-face and bold-face Gothic are always useful.

When buying display type of some good face it is always advisable to buy weight fonts of the entire series instead of job fonts. A weight font, say 25 pounds, will usually fill a job case, and give the printer plenty of characters to work with, while a job font contains only a few duplicates of each character.

Have only a limited number of good type faces, but have plenty of each size and character. Also have an abundance of 2-point leads, 6-point slugs, 12-point slugs, quads, spaces and metal furniture. Labor-saving brass rule—1-point face on 3-point body, is of particular advantage for borders of labels, panels for box-tops, etc.; 2-point face rule on 2-point body, and 6-point face rule on 6-point body, are also very useful. Running borders of artistic design, in 6-, 12-, 18- and 24-point sizes, are admirable for borders for box labels of the larger size.

For the printed matter on the fronts of small-size cartons, the box-maker will need a number of small, compressed type faces, such as for example: 6-, 8-, 10-, 12- and 14-point Extra Condensed Cheltenham Bold. Regular Condensed Cheltenham Bold, in these same sizes, will also be found very useful. Extra Condensed Gothic, in all sizes from 6-point to 72-point, is excellent for narrow-measure display composition on carton work, narrow labels for boxes and bottles, and so forth. These are facts which must be carefully considered by every box-maker who may be thinking of installing a printing plant.

Many small labels and fronts of cartons contain “Direction for Use,” and other information printed in very small type, and this means that the box-maker having a printing plant must use a considerable quantity of 5-point and 6-point body type. Old Style Roman is a good face for this class of composition, and it should be kept in open news cases on the top of type cabinets so as to make the work of setting as easy as possible for the compositors. It is the right thing to keep all job type stored in dust-proof cabinets, but in the case of small body type which is being used frequently, it is advantageous to keep it in open cases, despite the fact that open type cases are “dust collectors.”

Much of the smaller work for labels and cartons is of such an intricate character as to call for the use of a great deal of small-size type, like 5-point Old Style Roman, 6-point Extra Condensed Gothic, etc. Often the forms must be spaced out with the greatest care so as to make the forms fit small spaces. A complete assortment of thin copper spaces, and of 1-point brasses, laid out in small cases, will be found exceedingly useful for the fine spacing referred to.

It would be a mistake for anyone to be under the impression that box-makers’ printed matter is of the common-place variety, for many of the wrappers, box-tops and labels produced for fine candy boxes, rubber goods boxes, holiday boxes and other boxes are printed in the best style. The type forms and designs, in many instances, are works of art. This means that the compositor working in the box manufacturing factory should be a high grade craftsman, capable of producing first class display typography.

The typography for all box-makers’ printed matter should be simple and beautiful and easy to read. No ornaments, with the exception of borders, should be used. Good, clear-cut type faces are better than fancy type faces.

THE HARTFORD PRINTING PRESS

The Hartford platen printing press, made by the National Machine Company, of Hartford, Conn., is one of the best machines of its kind in the world, being built expressly for the finest class of half tone and color printing. By reason of its powerful construction, the Hartford Press, in addition to doing printing, is also capable of doing cutting and creasing. It may also be used for embossing. It should be understood by the reader that the National Company are making three different kinds of presses—printing presses, cutting and creasing presses, and embossing presses. The proper press should be used for each particular class of work, but just the same, the Hartford printing press is strong enough to do light cutting and creasing, and also embossing, in addition to printing.

The Hartford printing press is well adapted to spacious forms of type or plates for cartons, wrappers and labels. Often, on this machine, two or more wrappers, cartons or labels can be printed together on one sheet of stock. On fine color work, pictures, designs, etc., for art wrappers, the Hartford is especially useful. This machine is also adapted to close-register color printing on cardboard, as used for “set-in” forms for holiday boxes, necktie boxes and suspender boxes. The “set-in” forms, after being printed, can also be cut out to the required shape on the Hartford Printing Press.

THE JOHN THOMSON PRINTING PRESS

This is another of the first-class platen printing presses which is particularly suitable for the printing department of a paper-box plant. The John Thomson Printing Press is also known as the “Colt’s Armory” press, and it is famous for excellent color and half-tone work. The finest embossing, also light cutting and creasing, can be handled on this machine. For long runs of the finest close-register color work, for “holly” wrappers, pictures, fancy wrappers, etc., there is no better machine than the John Thomson press and many of these machines are being used on work of this class.

Many of the larger-size paper box wrappers, printed in colors, and embossed in gold, are produced on John Thomson printing presses, including the embossed work. Advertising novelties, cardboard fans, and other kinds of paper “cut-outs” are cut out on these machines. Cutting and creasing for all kinds of cartons are also done on the John Thomson printing presses, although heavy cutting and creasing should be done on regular cutting and creasing presses.

Later on the writer will explain how embossing and gold-leafing are done on platen printing presses.

THE MIEHLE CYLINDER PRESS

Miehle cylinder presses are in successful operation in many of the largest printing plants in America, and the adaptability of these machines to the finest half tone and color work is too well-known to require comment here. It is enough to say that for the printing departments of large paper box concerns, where cylinder presses are needed, no better machines could be installed than those made by the Miehle Printing Press and Manufacturing Co., of Chicago.

The Miehle Pony Cylinder Press is very useful for printing cartons, box wrappers, etc. Large Miehle Cylinder presses are excellent for printing heavy color plates as applied to the larger sizes of folding boxes, such as cereal boxes, tea boxes, spice boxes and so on. As many as a dozen of these cartons are printed on the one sheet of stock, being cut apart afterwards.

THE KIDDER AUTOMATIC PRINTING PRESS

Some of the larger manufacturers of both folding boxes and cartons are making good use of Kidder automatic printing presses in their printing plants. In some instances the Kidder is being used for printing cartons from large rolls of carton stock, and in other cases the machine is running on big orders of box labels printed from rolls of paper. Box labels may be printed in one or two colors on a special Kidder press, and the machine is equipped with a cutting device for cutting the labels to correct size as they are printed from the rolls of paper.

For complete information about these machines, write the Kidder Press Co., of Dover, N. H.

THE MILLER AUTOMATIC FEEDER FOR CHANDLER
& PRICE PRESSES

Recently the writer entered the printing department of a Philadelphia paper box manufacturing concern, and there were seen three Chandler & Price presses, equipped with Miller automatic feeders, running on large orders of box wrappers. One press was engaged in putting on the final color of a four-color design for a box wrapper; the second machine was running on a form printed in gold ink, and the third press was operating on a plain, black-ink job.

Two of these Chandler & Price presses were of the 12 × 18 size, and the other machine was of the 10 × 15 size. The three Miller feeders were working at high speed, feeding the blank sheets in the presses with no difficulty whatever. One pressman, assisted by a boy, was keeping these three platen presses continually busy on long runs of the wrappers. His principal work was in taking away the finished work, and in putting up new piles of stock to be printed.

Under the old system of feeding platen presses, it would have required one pressman and three young men, or young women, to keep these three presses in continual operation, but with the Miller feeders, the same amount of work, (or even a larger output of work) was being done by one pressman and one assistant.

Miller Feeders are now being made in three different sizes—8 × 12, 10 × 15, and 12 × 18—by the Miller Saw-Trimmer Co., of Pittsburgh, Pa. At the present time they are made only for Chandler & Price presses of the three sizes mentioned. These automatic feeders will handle all weights of stock, from onion skin paper to heavy cardboard, and they will feed the sheets to close register for color printing.

It should be understood that the Miller Saw-Trimmer Co. will supply the Miller Feeders separately, so that the buyer may have the feeders applied to C. & P. presses, or the company will furnish complete “units,” consisting of the C. & P. press, Miller feeder, ink fountain, counter, speed pulley, motor, etc.

There is another automatic platen press feeder, called the “Humana,” manufactured by The Humana Co., of Newark, N. J.

KINDS OF WORK DONE IN THE PRINTING DEPARTMENT
OF A PAPER BOX FACTORY

For those not familiar with the special class of work produced in the average printing department of a paper box factory, the following information should prove interesting and perhaps helpful:

The manufacture of fine set-up paper boxes, such as candy boxes for example, would use the printing department mainly for printing customers’ business cards, designs, and pictures on glazed paper wrappers. Here is a special field in itself, for there are many different kinds of box wrappers, many of them printed in colors, or printed, gold-leafed and embossed. Many of the fancy wrappers contain beautiful pictures, done in four or more colors, while other wrappers have business cards printed merely in one color.

Loose wrappers for toilet articles, perfumery, and other things of this variety are often printed in tints and colors. Some are done in colors and gold, and after being printed, are embossed.

Many of the fine loose wrappers are applied to both set-up boxes and folding boxes, and not a few of them are works of art. By covering a rough set-up paper box, or a cheap carton, with a handsomely-printed loose wrapper, the appearance of the box is wonderfully enhanced. This goes to show the great utility of the right kind of printed wrappers.

The manufacturer of set-up boxes would also have considerable demand for glazed labels, to be applied to the tops of writing paper boxes, rubber goods boxes, and so forth. In many instances, labels of this variety are printed in several colors and gold.

Some of the fine set-up boxes are first tight-wrapped with white or tinted glazed paper, and afterwards fancy printed labels are pasted to the top of the lids and to the sides of the lids.

The demand for holiday boxes, particularly the kind loose wrapped with glazed paper containing holly designs, pictures of pretty girls’ heads, etc., is constantly increasing, and all of this variety of printing would also be needed by the set-up box manufacturer. The same manufacturer would perhaps require printed partitions, cut out of box-board, for inserts in neckwear boxes, suspender boxes and other holiday boxes. These cardboard “set-ins” are often printed with fancy designs in colors and gold.

In the printing department of a folding box factory the style of printed matter would be different from the fine wrappers and labels which have been referred to. Here the major portion of printing would be done on cartons, although plain labels would frequently be needed for cartons.

Large-size cartons for cereals, tea, dried fruits, spices, butter, cake, rice, powders, and medicine bottles are often printed in several colors, no labels or wrapper being needed. Other cartons have printed labels applied to their fronts, while others still call for printed wrappers of the “loose” style.

There is always a tremendous amount of printed matter required by both set-up box-makers and folding-box manufacturers, and therefore the average box-maker’s print shop is seldom idle.

In the next chapter the writer will take up the subject of practical printing as done in the box-maker’s plant.