Paper Question For Self-Printed Pages

For those who print their own pages, what brand, weight, and color do you use?

I've been thinking of going with Steiner pages and printing as I go, so I'm looking for more information before making a commitment.

Dale

I've been using Staples' Premier Color Laser, 32 lbs. Its working really well for me with my Steiner pages.

http://www.stampsmarter.com/learnin...sePaper.html

Don

I'm using Staple's 67 lbs Cover Stock for my Steiner pages.

I use Office Depot 67 lbs Ivory for my Album Easy paes

Peter

I use Domtar Earthchoice 28/70 (104 gsm) cream.

Neenah 67 lb Exact Vellum, sourced from Amazon. It is a warmer, near-Manila color, which I like with black Showgard mounts.

Domtar Earthchoice 70 lb 104gsm Vellum Ivory Their item # 81080.

Southworth linen Business cover stock, 65 lbs. It comes in white, ivory and grey. I've used both the white and the ivory, both nice and it has a nice texture. Takes ink-jet ink well, without smearing or soaking.

110lbs Neenah paper in white. I put them into Avery slip case, so there is no hole punching, and I can decide to use single page or 2 page per slip cover. I tend to keep spare mounts in between the pages so when I add new stamps, I have the mount ready in the page (I keep them in a small glassine).
This is good heavy stock. Prints through my Canon 8380 laser like a champ, no curling.

HP Premium 32 lb, white. I use to use cover stock, but feeding it through my printer 1 page at a time got a bit tedious. That, and changing from single country to worldwide helped me decide.

I use Georgia Pacific 110-lbs white acid free card stock for my Steiner pages.
I like a heavier page.

For those using heavier paper stock, what kind of binders do you use? (Sorry if this is getting off topic).

Any good 67 lb (or close to that weight) cover stock will work fine. I've used paper from Staples both in "creme" and another shade of white. Heavier paper up to 100 lbs will work but it seems awfully thick to me, and it might have difficulty going through a standard home printer. Thinner paper will work, too, of course, but it may not hold up over time (ripped holes, and so on).

Most people seem to use ordinary (cheap) three-ring binders from an office supply store. I find that look cheap and unappealing especially for something I value. I've also found find rings in such binders can tear at the page holes and damage them. Squared off rings may work better than round rings. And they will hold a few more pages.

For the few times I've done this (I use mainly standard larger sized albums), my preference is to hole punch card stock with 22 holes using a 22-hole punch I purchased on ebay. This hole punch is common in Europe and makes for a much nicer looking album than three holes -- more "album-like". It also makes page turning without snagging on the rings much easier. Finding a 22 hole punch may take awhile. It's easy to punch these holes, and I like the result much better.

Only if you do not care that you may ruin your stamps. You get exactly what you pay for with paper (there is NO other item more of a commodity than paper). If you buy cheap crap paper, even if it is marketed to you as 'acid free', you will get paper with acids in it.
http://www.stampsmarter.com/learnin...sePaper.html

Folks can buy and use cheap paper all day long if they desire, but they should be making this decision understanding the facts.
Don

Yes, Don, thanks for that. Here's the key section from Don's website:

"The specifications for true archival paper are --
"Manufactured with only high alpha cellulose pulp from purified wood fiber with 25% cotton or greater
"Buffered with calcium carbonate 2-3% alkaline reserve, pH 9 ±0.5
"Passes the PAT (Photographic Activity Test) ISO IT 18916 (formerly ISO 14523 ANSI IT9.16)
"Sulfur content is less than 0.0008% reducible sulfur
"Lignin content is tested by TAPPI 236 cm-85 and has a Kappa number of less than five"

"This quality paper is costly, the costs for 8-1/2 x 11 paper can range from 15-18 cents per page. Compared to the typical 1-2 cents for the inexpensive 'acid free' paper found at your local office supply store and you can see why some folks gravitate towards the lower quality paper . . . ."

And that tells you all you need to know about why typical stamp collectors go to Staples and buy "acid free" paper. They don't want to spend a lot of money. They don't have any idea where they'd find genuine archival paper (and it's too expensive if they do find it). Staples or Office Depot is much easier to deal with. And so on. Offhand, I don't know of any seller of archival paper, either locally or online. I'm sure they exist. This is one major reason why I collect not on office supply store paper but on real album pages from major album manufacturers. Even their paper may not be truly "archival," though. I don't like 8.5 x 11" size album pages, don't like three-ring binders, and I"m suspicious of the quality of office supply store paper. But there's nothing I can do about the fact that print-your-own albums are very popular and many collectors see them as a way to save money. You pays your money, and you makes your choice.

For comparison, blank (or even printed) album pages from major stamp publishers can cost from 50¢ a page up to a few dollars a page. An annual supplement from Scott might have 10 pages and cost $15. That's $1.50 a page. A set of pages from Scott might have 70 pages and cost $50. That's 70¢ a page. And that's at the cheap end of the album spectrum. Schaubek, Davo, and Lighthouse pages are well more costly than that, costing a few dollars a page, at least. Part of this is whether a page has mounts or not. Even their blank pages are about as expensive. If I remember correctly, White Ace album pages used to cost $1.00-2.00 a page before they closed up shop.

I think of $1.00 a page as my upper limit and 50¢ a page as what I'd like to pay -- or less. That rules out Lighthouse albums (unless they're used) and some others. Scott pages will work, though.

The one bright spot I've found is blank Schaubek pages. They retail for between 30¢ and 50¢ a blank page, depending on border, background (quadrille or not), and whether they're "all blank" with no border or not. That's a stone-cold deal for high quality large album pages. But are they "archival"? I imagine so. But I don't know. Their hole-punch is for their own binders, but they can also be used in springback binders and punched to fit others, as well. I know because I've done that, punching Schaubek blank pages for 22-ring binders. It works really well. Just a tip. No charge.

By the way, typical office supply store cover stock at Staples comes in 200-250 sheet packages for the 67 lb. variety, and sells for about $18 a package. That's 7-8¢ a page, not 1-2¢ a page which would, I imagine, be for ordinary printer paper. Don't use ordinary printer paper to make a stamp album. Please.

So the range in cost for blank paper seems to be:
Around 7-8¢ a page for cover stock from Staples. No extra charge for the acid.
Maybe 30¢ a page for Schaubek blank paper. MIght be "archival"?
Maybe 50¢ a page for Scott blank paper.
$1.00 and up for the other blank paper like Lighthouse, Davo etc.
Linen-hinged and fancy paper is going to cost you at least $2.00 a page, maybe. .

If you can find real "archival quality" paper at a price toward the lower-end of this spectrum, it would be a real bargain. Now if I could just find archival, linen-hinged blank paper for 25¢ a sheet, that would be nice . . . .