Saddle Stitched Booklets

Look no farther! We are particularly well equipped to produce soft cover booklets in the 4 page to 96 page plus cover sizes. We specialize in One and Two Color Booklets, we do not produce full color booklets.

Our saddle stitched booklets can have a cover and are held together with two stitches through the spine.

See the paragraphs below for booklet construction details. This type of book is usually much less expensive than perfect bound glued books and can be produced in a variety of standard page sizes from 4.25 in. by 5.5 in. up to 8.5 x 11 in. (Smaller sizes are available on a custom basis.)

The 8.5 in. by 11 in. page size booklet is especially inexpensive to produce and is one of our specialties. This size is preferred for corporate reports, calendars, software manuals, employee manuals, conference schedules and advertising handouts.

Minimum quantity is 250 identical booklets.

Booklets are produced in signatures containing 4 or more pages each that are then nested (gathered and inserted) together and stitched through the spine or fold (the uninitiated say stapled) to make a rough booklet. Then the rough booklets are trimmed on three sides to obtain a smooth, professional look for the finished booklets.

Taking the standard 11" x 8.5" booklet as an example, many printers (and us) can produce small booklet jobs that are assembled with 4 page signatures (an 11" x 17" sheet printed on both sides and folded to make 4 pages.) The total number of inside pages must be divisible by 4 for the saddle-stitch process to work (e.g., 4, 12, 28, 88, etc.)

A separate cover (another special 4 page signature) can be added on the outside of the booklet or the booklet can be "self-covered", a type of booklet where the outside pages of the booklet are produced on the same type of paper as the inside pages.

The page count of the booklet is the single largest factor in the price of the book. Misunderstandings over the correct page count can cause booklets estimates to be very, very incorrect. Our estimates consider each side of each sheet in a FINISHED booklet as a separate page. Inside page counts do not count the cover. Thus a booklet might be referred to as a 12 page booklet plus cover, meaning 12 inside pages plus a 4 page cover. For example, a standard four page 11" x 8.5" booklet with no cover would be formed from a single 11" x 17" sheet, folded to 11" x 8.5", forming 4 pages.

One of the reasons that the Talley Press can produce booklets in a less expensive and faster manner is that our presses are large enough to produce 16 page signatures (a 23" x 35" sheet printed on two sides and folded to make 16 pages).

Larger signatures mean less handling of pages, less work in assembling and thus less cost. Also as 16 pages are printed at a time rather than just 4 pages the book is produced faster.

Thus books containing a total number of pages divisible by 16 are the most efficient and the least costly to produce (e.g., 16, 32, 48, 64, 80 and 96.) Don't worry if your book does not end on a 16 page boundary as we combine 4 page, 8 page and 16 page signatures to produce the number of pages needed (page count must be divisible by 4).

Use the Estimate option on the menu above and request a Custom Booklet Estimate. When you request your estimate, please be certain of the finished page size and the total number of finished pages.

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