Why did Publisher mailmerge lose text in many newsletter frames?

[Mary Sauer]

Allen, Is there a particular reason why you cannot do a straightforward merge without
converting to a publication?

 

[Allan C]

Last month I talked and taught our printer company into accepting a download
in *.pub format and learning enough Publisher to print our 11x17 pages in
book fold format. He used to lay 8.5x11 pages side by side, copy them to
11x17s and copy those to a book fold. This month this first time download was
somewhat dificult for him to learn because of only being 10 pages. It had to
be two publications with fixed page numbering.

I have several photo and laser printers at home, but their all 8.5x11. The
newsletter is for a charitable organization that doesn't own a decent
printer. He originally came up with various reasons why he couldn't do it
from a download. Finally, he was ultimately happy learning a new thing. He
does a very good printing job, far cheaper than the big chain copier
companies, so it would be silly to move on to Kinkos or another company and
it's worth my time to work with him.

Since he now knows how to do a print from Publisher, it's not a big step for
him to print a mail merged publication which, because it's in sorted Zip code
and address order, will save us postage.

I do convert the newsletter to single page 8.5x11 inch PDF for displaying on
the web to our members. It's not a two page book fold though.

I've already tested a book fold PDF as a backup method, but it adds extra
steps and he really doesn't know how to print it. He originally stated, with
conviction, that the reverse pages would print upside down. At this point,
it's too much trouble to convince him otherwise. I'd have to take over the
printing function at his shop to prove it one way or the other.

I want to move along in little steps month by month. For the time being, I'm
willing to do a final edit of the newsletter using cut and pastes to get rid
of text box links between pages. If Microsoft cures the problem, this all
will become quite simple.

 

[Allan C]

Thinking about it, the first thing I ever did from the standpoint of having
the printer company get the newsletter on-line was to send him a 12 page copy
of the previous month's newsletter in PDF format. This was the one he stated
printed the reverse pages upside down.

I got a lot of advice from a newsletter editor's group to just drop that
printer company but some experiments with a major copier company made me
unhappy because of printing our newsletter with a printer obviously out of
toner. Checking prices I decided to stay with him. The printer company then
offered to to print using Publisher, knowing I was using it. That eventually
worked well with a lot of hand holding.

I'm also trying to reduce the hastle of getting our volunteers ready at the
right time and reducing the time they have to spend on it by printing
addresses directly on it.

 

[Ed Bennett]

I've already tested a book fold PDF as a backup method, but it adds
extra steps and he really doesn't know how to print it. He originally
stated, with conviction, that the reverse pages would print upside
down.

Does he actually run a print shop or a copy shop?

If it ias actually a print shop, I have no idea why he doesn't know how to
print a PDF file.

Reverse pages will print upside down if and only if you have the duplex
options set incorrectly in the printer driver (or whatever options are
present on the commercial press system, if he is using one)

 

[Mary Sauer]

Hi again Allan,
I do hope you can resolve this in some manner. There is talk of a service pack, I
expect this can be fixed.

 

[Allan C]

The shop does a better job than anyone else in the area at less cost. I
would be extraordinarily remiss as the editor of a charitable organizations
news letter to drop him just because I'm impatient.

I've already discussed this at great length with a newsletter editors email
group and, for that matter, with this group, and have decided the best course
is to hold this print shop's hand and nurse him along.