Printers of Discworld Cinderellas

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   I was boring my brother senseless yesterday with tales of the great Lawyers' Guild apostrophe and paper debacle and, as he slumped senseless to the floor I thought "I wonder which printers have produced which DW stamps?".

I know that Enchede were used for some of the early stamps but beyond that vague piece of info I know nothing.  I can't find it anywhere Discworld related.  Can anyone throw any light on this?

Keith

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Keith Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Mint Joined: 30 March 2010 Location: Derbyshire, UK Status: Offline Points: 1119	Post Options Post Reply Quote Keith Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Topic: Printers of Discworld Cinderellas Posted: 02 May 2010 at 04:38
	I was boring my brother senseless yesterday with tales of the great Lawyers' Guild apostrophe and paper debacle and, as he slumped senseless to the floor I thought "I wonder which printers have produced which DW stamps?". I know that Enchede were used for some of the early stamps but beyond that vague piece of info I know nothing. I can't find it anywhere Discworld related. Can anyone throw any light on this? Keith

Hilary Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Special Joined: 30 March 2010 Location: Dorset Status: Offline Points: 618	Post Options Post Reply Quote Hilary Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Posted: 05 May 2010 at 10:30
	An Irish company did the Unseen University stamps. More recently it's been the lovely gents in Somerset at Rose Mills. But for the greater part of the Discworld stamp history, the only person who can tell you is Colin, who kept it a closely guarded secret, which not even Bernard and Isobel were privy to. You can try asking him......
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Colin Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Unhinged Joined: 29 March 2010 Location: United Kingdom Status: Offline Points: 2500	Post Options Post Reply Quote Colin Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Posted: 05 May 2010 at 23:09
	hi Keith! What mischief! I'm not going to get drawn into this on a public forum. Suffice to say that invoices for printing were sent to the shop - so I can only assume they knew, and were happy with, whoever they had contracted to provide their finished products - no great secrets there. The reality is that the best 'Trade' printers do not even hang a sign over their door, and do not seek publicity for their work, for whatever reason, and I will continue to respect that. Edited by Colin - 05 May 2010 at 23:10
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Keith Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Mint Joined: 30 March 2010 Location: Derbyshire, UK Status: Offline Points: 1119	Post Options Post Reply Quote Keith Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Posted: 06 May 2010 at 02:09
	How odd! No mischief intended. I can't begin to think why there should be even the slightest coyness about the printing process and who did what. I think every book I have says who printed it; every stamp catalogue I have lists the printers of every stamp. Discworld stamps seem odd like that. Secretive about small things. I was hoping to entertain and engage our Discworld-collecting members. I'll have to think of some other arcane question instead. Keith

Murgatroyd Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Special Joined: 30 March 2010 Location: London UK Status: Offline Points: 554	Post Options Post Reply Quote Murgatroyd Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Posted: 06 May 2010 at 02:41
	I would guess that there is a degree of concern that some unscrupulous collector might make an approach to the printer in question and try and obtain any old sheets or artwork that they might still have on hand as samples of their work. Obviously I don't mean you in this context Keith, but there's always a chance that there's someone out there somewhere who might try it. The printer won't want bozos coming round to their place of work and bothering them about that sort of thing. Even if they don't have any old Discworld stuff on hand, (and I'm sure that it's part of the deal that they don't), there's always the possibility that they might still print up other Cinderella stamps... I'm sure they don't want shady looking types rummaging through their garbage in the hope of finding something rare and resalable. Not divulging their identity is a purely a matter of courtesy and good business practice.
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Keith Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Mint Joined: 30 March 2010 Location: Derbyshire, UK Status: Offline Points: 1119	Post Options Post Reply Quote Keith Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Posted: 06 May 2010 at 02:52
	I can see that being bothered by bozos would be a bad thing. But I thought we were discussing, at least in the early days, proper security printers. Like Cartor, or Enchede or De La Rue or Irish Security Stamp Printing. These guys print, say, British and Irish Stamps and are proud to be known for that and do it without secrecy. I've never heard of them having problems with queues of shady characters waiting for a rummage in their bins.

Colin Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Unhinged Joined: 29 March 2010 Location: United Kingdom Status: Offline Points: 2500	Post Options Post Reply Quote Colin Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Posted: 06 May 2010 at 05:46
	Hi Keith, printers are peculiar fellows. I have the greatest of respect for my printers, some of whom I have worked with for nearly 30 years and if I am asked not to reveal their identity I will not do so. The majority of printers of Discworld stamps were not security printers or stamp printers, just excellent quality jobbing printers. 'Trade' printers print all sorts of material for all sorts of people (frequently overflow work from other printers) and do not encourage visitors to see their presses or their customer book. As I said earlier some of the best ones do not even show any external sign of being printers, a bit of a pain when you are trying to track them down. As for security printers not being bothered about 'bozos' pinching stuff from their bins - I couldn't get into Enschede without bringing my passport for ID. Printers who print stamps and currency are in fact very, very touchy and wouldn't even allow me to see their presses running. Competition for work and reputation between specialised stamp printers is very tight and confidentiality is absolutely everything. I suppose part of the reason for the secretiveness of some aspects of producing the DW stamps is that we (designers, illustrators, marketing folks and collectors) have all convinced ourselves to a greater or lesser degree that the stamps were printed in Ankh-Morpork. Revealing who did precisely what, and when, and how, seems to take the fantasy out of it. Something entertaining and engaging to discuss perhaps? And applicable to all fantasy cinderella issues, not only DW. How far should reality and fantasy overlap? It amuses me that the discussion would frequently come up that the printers in A-M would not have had access to modern digital or litho processes. Yet buyers are still happy to overlook details such as on the recent 'colour test' that has white lettering reversed out of (ie not printed with inks, letting the white paper show through) the coloured stamps that were supposed to be being 'tested'. Apart from the impracticality of obscuring how the colour affects the design area of each stamp - the very factor being tested - this would never have been economical or practical with old technology. To have removed by hand the inkable areas from a traditional hot metal plate, in each separation of each colour used, and in perfect registration, in order to achieve a reversed out white lettering that would only be seen briefly by the handful of people approving the stamp colour, would have been unthinkable. Printers in those days would have just over-printed the title in all-concealing black, or discretely rubber stamped it by hand, or more likely would have lightly and reverently handwritten in pencil the title in the margin, and defintely not all over their labours of love - the stamps themselves. So how far should imagination take over from reality in such things? Edited by Colin - 06 May 2010 at 05:50
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Steve Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Unhinged Joined: 26 March 2010 Location: Wrexham Status: Offline Points: 3917	Post Options Post Reply Quote Steve Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Posted: 06 May 2010 at 06:50
	This explains why the Welsh Oddities series has been a bit sparse on the details of the printers. That's my excuse anyway. Lack of detail is not through lack of research.
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Colin Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Unhinged Joined: 29 March 2010 Location: United Kingdom Status: Offline Points: 2500	Post Options Post Reply Quote Colin Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Posted: 06 May 2010 at 08:05
	I was telling Alan earlier today about an ad agency colleague of ours who asked a (young) designer about who was going to be printing their company's brochure. Its being printed by Heidelberg she said, in Norwich, and they are one of the oldest printers in the industry... She had picked it up from reading a webpage and was adamant that she knew exactly what she was talking about. Of course, Heidelberg is the name of one of the oldest printing press manufacturers, not the company that run the press.
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Daniel Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Mint Joined: 30 March 2010 Location: London Status: Offline Points: 1170	Post Options Post Reply Quote Daniel Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Posted: 06 May 2010 at 12:39
	It is a little bit odd that a printing company doesn't want to be identified, maybe they don't need any new business (or they work for MI5), but if that is their wish then clearly Colin has to respect that. Maybe it's sufficient to know that they are not security printers and so would not be familiar to us anyway. I think that those of us from a philatelic background are more interested in knowing things like the printer so Keith isn't alone in his mischief. More generally, I've always found it strange that, on the Discworld forum, whenever someone has had a technical question which could readily be answered by No.41, it is left to other forum members to conjecture.