mat board...who has the best prices?

[fdi]

At Frame Destination, we are in the process of adding 4-Ply Alpharag and our price for 16x20 with window cut will be $10.64 at qty one with volume discounts starting at qty 4. Our price for a blank 16x20 (no window) will be $8.47. Frame Destination is an APUG sponsor and we ship from Dallas, TX. We already have 8-Ply Alpharag on our website but only in a couple colors. We will be adding 4-Ply with many colors and adding lots of colors to our 8-Ply selection.

Our prices are better than Documounts for precuts and currently Documounts prices are better for blanks but we are lowering our blank prices when we add the 4-ply mats. Another thing to watch out for with Documounts is that custom sizes are just marked up to next standard size so your price for pano can be double or triple companies that do not do that.

It looks like Lodima probably has better prices than us for blanks. So in general if you go with us for precuts and Lodima for blanks you will be getting a better price and in both cases using an Apug sponsor.

Lodima apparently has pro photographers...myself, I am amateur photographer and founded Frame Destination due to the lack of frames available for 3:2 aspect ratio prints.

Cheers,
Mark

Price comparison: the documounts price includes the window cut. So, a comparison would be
16x20 alpharag w/window cut:
documounts=$11.34
lodima=13.84 (3.84 +5+5)

Jon

[billschwab]

...and in both cases using an Apug sponsor.

All apologies to APUG sponsors as I wasn't trying to undermine you. I too am an APUG sponsor, but I also know there are other sources out there and do, on occasion, use them for the things I need. I would think that supporting anyone that supplies our small community is a good thing and I simply wanted to alert people to another tried and true source.

As for confusion and difficulty with the site I recommended, I don't get that at all. I don't see how it could be much more simple. So it goes...

[fdi]

All apologies to APUG sponsors as I wasn't trying to undermine you.

No worries from me Bill. I was just trying to help add data since that is where the thread was going. In my case (as owner of Frame Destination), I view all my competitors as extensions of my own company to help customers that we are not ideally suited to help. In other words, as far as I am concerned I have no competition. Documounts is another good company and I have not heard anything bad about them. No company can be everything to everyone.

Cheers,
Mark

[jd callow]

No worries from me Bill. I was just trying to help add data since that is where the thread was going. In my case (as owner of Frame Destination), I view all my competitors as extensions of my own company to help customers that we are not ideally suited to help. In other words, as far as I am concerned I have no competition. Documounts is another good company and I have not heard anything bad about them. No company can be everything to everyone.

Cheers,
Mark

Excellent attitude and one that can only be beneficial in the long run. Good on ya Mark.\.

[Michael A. Smith]

All companies cannot be all things to all people. We sell some things less expensively than others and no doubt others sell some things less expensively than we do. And they provide things we do not provide.

Regarding our "set-up" charge that Jon Shiu mentioned a few posts back: That $5 charge for overmats windows is only charged once for a lifetime for each size. That other vendors sell 25-sheet packs indicates that most folks make a considerable number of prints in each size. Amortizing that size over the number of mat boards once will need in a lifetime it adds almost nothing to the cost of our overmats.

Michael A. Smith
Lodima Archival Materials