LETTERPRESS SUPPLES
Most items are currently in stock. We can handle most requests and usually ship within 24 hours.
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We carry more than 1,000 items for all your printing needs.
We are open for business as of September 27th. This summer we had some good news about Pressboard. Our mill order has been made and it was picked up from the mill in Vermont, Monday, June 19. We began filling back orders by the following Monday, June 26. But the bad news is that the mill has increased its minimum order to 40,000 pounds. That's an awful lot of paper. The mill, formerly owned by Neenah Paper, started us off with pressboard by the 125 sheet carton, then by the 1000 pound skid, and now what amounts to a boxcar load minimum order. We will see what happens.
We are enjoying some nice rain and cooler weather as a nice break from the heat of upper 70s and low 80s. The daily temperatures go from around 30 as it was this morning but it is supposed to edge into the 60s while the lower country will hit the 80s and even 90s. The heavy smoke we have seen daily from the Western forest fires is now abating. We are starting to get the mountains back from the overwhelming hordes of tourists that have descended on us. We've even had frost in the morning. The train is running 2 trains a day this summer, though one is pulled by a diesel engine from Alaska and the other by a steam engine, and the town council prohibition on OHVs and ATVs this summer has been over turned by petition so it has been an interesting summer. The mayor of Silverton has made the international news as local turmoil caused the town hall to close down for a while this summer.
Our plan is to make it through the new decade alive. So far the plan is working. Let's hope that 2021 offers more promise than 2020, and maybe we can make it through the first weeks of the new year. We are trying something new by cleaning out our messages on the phone. Moving with the times, we will start answering our messages, hopefully, the same day, and going through all the junk and robocalls to get to your message. Then I guess we'll start messaging and we will be modernized.
We finally received several of our die-cut tympans including the Heidelberg 10x15 size. We doubled the amount we normally order to stay ahead of the delays that are happening. We are shipping this week. Our suppliers are all still working and they are all over the country. We continue to have UPS and Post Office service every day even though avalanches across the highway have cut us off for parts of a day. Remember that we do not charge your credit card until we actually ship your order. Rollers are still being made in one or two days with no slowdown and those orders have no delay. We are exercising all the restrictions while still staying open.
The UPS guy stops by daily and so does the FedEx person, and we see the occasional walker and car drive past. Our train that has been our mainstay for so many years ran only two test trains in 2020 and has resumed business on a limited schedule this year. Some of our customers are taking on projects, especially their Vandercooks, now that they have time to work on them. We maintain a safe workplace and rarely have contact with outside people. The locals maintain their distance from the tourists to a large extent. Our construction business has remained viable with work on the county courthouse, a high-end hotel, and for our historical society.
Supply issues continue to be a problem as some products are no longer available. We do have adequate supplies of most sizes of tympan on hand. Don't count on anything being available in the future as we have in the past. Almost everyone in the letterpress supply business is past retirement age with few ready to take over. As we venture half way past this year, and 2021 is still in trouble, we are having a reasonable year.
We prefer that orders be placed through this website rather than phone calls. Handwritten notes with the wrong hand are sometimes hard to read, so help out your order--there is a place on the web site order form to write about special needs or questions.
Fritz Klinke
Bev Rich, Loren Lew, Rick Hunter, Casey Carroll, Fritz Klinke having lunch in our old restaurant, the Pickle Barrel, 2019. These are the folks who have been instrumental in my recovery. Loren is also my business partner for the past 45 years.
Fritz's House, an 1887-era Victorian, Winter 2018-2019. The winter was very cold with most nights below zero. The summer of 2021 has seen a drop in ATV/OHV use we saw last summer with an overwhelming crush of mainly folks from Texas. No trains all of 2020 but this summer we have two trains a day with social distancing. As things return to normal, we face the same problem as the rest of the country with a serious lack of people willing to work. We used to serve three meals a day seven days a week in our Silverton restaurant but the current owners are reduced to 5 days a week lunch only. Strange times.
Introducing our new Assistant--
Missy, new to NA Graphics and the arcane world of letterpress printing.
