What would the printing industry be without paper? The Internet?

Like marriage without love, Desi without Lucy, or crème without the brulee — printing without paper is inconceivable. And no fun at all. Luckily, printing & paper still cut a mighty fine figure together.

More than anything else, paper is tactile. It’s all texture, color, and finish. And as much as there is to know about printing — there’s just as much to know about paper.

How can you learn about current paper choices, or what paper might be best for your project, or what new paper is being produced by what mills — and a host of other critical paper issues? By working with a specifications representative from one of several paper merchants or paper mills.

Remember, paper mills make paper. Mills sell paper generally through paper merchants, who in turn sell paper to end users and to printers, too.

Specification reps are paper specialists who work for either merchants or mills. Their job is to meet with buyers and graphic designers and recommend papers, discuss trends, and supply dummies and swatch books (paper samples). 

For the most part, no one merchant or mill carries every brand of paper. But spec reps, as these specialists are called, know all about available paper, even if they don’t carry a particular brand. 

What’s the value of specifying paper through a spec rep? Well, they give you personal, professional advice and service, which helps you choose the best paper for a particular job. They can get dummies made up for you. Good spec reps give programs on paper for their customers — they’ll come to your corporate office or design studio and tell you all you want to know about paper. 

Spec reps are a wealth of resources for the end user. They provide promotional as well as educational material for their customers.

They’re kind of like a traveling troupe of paper pros, these folks, bringing you all kinds of beautiful printed materials and the latest swatch books to help inspire your choice of paper. 

If you take their paper advice, just remember to tell your printer to use them when specifying paper for that particular job: it’s how they’re compensated. (But I ‘spec you knew that already.)