What’s New at Zookbinders? « Zookbinders Blog

Archive for the ‘What’s New at Zookbinders?’ Category

You Ask: We Respond

Thursday, April 8th, 2010

National trade shows like I-USA and WPPI not only give us the opportunity to show our latest and greatest products, but let us talk to you, the working photographer, and get feedback about our products, what – if anything – we can improve, and what kind of new products you’re looking for. This year’s conventions were no different and we collected some great input and have some exciting things to announce for the coming year.

Soft Cover Value Packs are a hit. While we were confident we had something good with our Soft Cover Press Book Value Packs, we were overwhelmed by the positive response. You saw the tremendous value of being able to purchase quantities of replica soft cover books for use as gifts and promotional items and were are looking forward to creating many of these book sets for you. To help everyone try this new product out, we will be offering a free set with the album of your choice starting April 1, 2010 – stay tuned for details.

New cover choices are on the way. We’ve always prided ourselves on offering the finest albums with only the finest grade leather. With all of the album choices in the market now, you’ve asked us if we’d ever offer new cover options. We are happy to say yes. Later this year you can expect to see new cover choices including metal and fabric covers to compliment our genuine leather and Reflectionz covers.

Non-gloss PhotoBook and PhotoBook pages. We thought we had it when we launched our new PhotoBook Plus line last summer with a matte laminate. Unfortunately, the quality of that finish did not live up to our expectations. Since the beginning of this year we’ve been busy testing various new paper, laminate and coating combinations to find a non-gloss page finish that will live up to our high standards and insure a book that will last at least as long as our glossy laminate – which is 40 years. You can expect to see this new page finish by June.

We thank you for your continued business, input and loyalty. It is with your input that we will continue to lead this industry in innovation and quality and offer you books and albums that you and your clients can be proud of.

Tags: new products, photo albums, What's New at Zookbinders?
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New Finish on the Horizon

Monday, April 5th, 2010

For several months you have been asking when we’d re-introduce a non-gloss page finish for our popular PhotoBook and PhotoBook Plus product lines. We appreciate your patience and want to update you on our progress.

Printing quality digital press books is not as simple as just running paper through a press. There are a variety of paper characteristics that may make a paper stock good for one use but not for our books. What we are looking for when making a high quality book is paper that can do the following:

• Has the proper weight to give our books their distinctive heavy pages

• Holds ink well and will not scratch or discolor without being coated or laminated

• Will fold cleanly and not “crack” in the center

• Accepts our glues and holds together over time

• Lays flat in varying temperatures and humidity levels so that whether we’re shipping an album to South Florida, Arizona or Alaska, it will continue to look beautiful

Since December we’ve tested literally dozens of different papers. Some papers didn’t accept the glues we use to hold the pages together. Several papers wouldn’t properly accept the press inks and would easily scratch or discolor at the crease. Some would curl over time. We have recently found a paper we believe will work. It has a gorgeous, non-gloss finish and so far has been meeting all of our quality specifications. We still have further testing to do along with working out delivery arrangements through the paper mill. If all goes well, this new, non-gloss paper option should be available by June and offer a book that we know will hold up in the long run. We thank you again for your patience and look forward to sharing this new paper with you.

Tags: album specifications, wedding albums, What's New at Zookbinders
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Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day

Wednesday, March 31st, 2010

Did you know that April 25 is Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day? I bet you didn’t. I remember making our own pinhold cameras in high school and it’s been a long time since I’ve played with this fun little camera.

If you look it up in Wikapedia: A pinhole camera is a very simple camera with no lens and a single very small aperture. Simply explained, it is a light-proof box with a small hole in one side. Light from a scene passes through this single point and projects an inverted image on the opposite side of the box. Cameras using small apertures and the human eye in bright light both act like a pinhole camera.

Lensbaby is sponsoring an open call for photographers to submit their best pinhole images. Photographers can submit two images for consideration. The contest began March 23 and electronic submissions will be accepted until 6pm, PST, April 9, 2010. Online voting will begin on April 9th and end on April 16th. The winning images will be announced April 23rd. Check out their web site for details and happy shooting.

Want to build your own digital pinhole camera? Check out this site.

Tags: pin hole camera
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Great Informational Videos

Wednesday, March 17th, 2010

A special plug here for our friend Robin Pesa. Besides being owner of Bellissima Photographic Artistry, she owns DoodleDo, a post-production studio for professional photographers and their clients. As part of DoodleDo, she frequently creates online videos featuring various products. She has a great collection of videos featuring Zookbinders – take a look.

Thanks and four paws to you Robin!

Posted in Marketing Madness, Tech and Design Tips, What's New at Zookbinders? | No Comments »

We’re All Fans of Facebook

Wednesday, March 17th, 2010

A big thanks to all of our clients and fans. We recently announced that if you become a fan of the Zookbinders Facebook page, you will gain access to a special promo code good for 30% off any PhotoBook Plus order through the end of this month. If we reach 500 fans by March 31, 2010 we’ll extend the offer through the end of April 2010. Thanks to the great response, we’re almost there. We only need ten more fans and we’ll be extending the code. You will find the code on a tab on our Facebook page that is only accessible to fans. You can use this code as many times as you’d like!