Staples Folding Service Review

Staples offers a cheap and high quantity folding service for people who need brochures or menus printed and folded. However, beyond the cheap price, is their folding service that great? Let's examine to make sure. To be honest, there is really little good to say about this service at Staples. The price is $0.02 a sheet, which is very reasonable, but that's about it. The problem in this service rests in the machine used, which is so incredibly specific and prone to jamming that you could quickly find your documents ripped and shredded.

Before getting into all the problems, let me suggest right now that if you are planning to have things folded, make sure that they are copies and not originals. It's actually best if you print them at Staples, because if they mess the job up the will reprint the mistakes and either try again, do it by hand, or ask another store to see if they can do the folding correctly.

With that out of the way, let's look at the problems.

As I said, the machine has to be set very specifically, according to the type of fold (they offer gate, Z, tri, and bi folds, so you get a good variety) and the paper size. Also the paper type cannot exceed 24lb. This is their normal printing paper, but if you bring in your own printing make sure it is not thicker than this. Your sheets will suck in incorrectly or will just keep jamming.

Normally, the only paper that folds remotely correct is 8.5x11. 8.5x14 and 11x17 sometimes work, but rarely.

When the machine sucks in the pages, the force of the folding actually begins setting off the belts, and thereby the fold gets messed up. So the first few sheets of a stack may be folded correctly, but the more sheets it takes in the more the fold will go off. Soon, one edge will be overlapping another, or it will completely fold over a side.

Sometimes as well, if it begins dragging in more than one sheet at a time, it will smudge the prints at best, and will shred them at worst.

Honestly, the folding service at Staples is not that great, and it would probably be better just to fold it by hand. If there are too many to fold, then ensure you print it with them. Again, they will reprint any mess ups, and worst comes to worse they will begin folding by hand.