I've been getting quotes on black/white decks & color decks from the printers in my area (Wisconsin), they're posted over on my thread called 'One MORE Deck Hits The Table', so you can see what they've been quoting me for just the basics--a xeroxed deck mostly, OR a color-separated, printed deck. The costs are pretty high with color. Personally, I'm going with black & white printing.
The defining part is that many printers don't have the machines to do cards on card stock, their printers don't pull the sheets in straight with the rollers most times. For heavy duty card stock one place told me I'd have to have them send the job to Madison, but that mine was too small a job for them to bother with. ??? Well boo hoo. Ok, so it was only 1,200 sheets!
Check around--check with printers, and places that Xerox like Office Depot, Office Max, Kinkos, Econoprint, etc. Check if the PRINTERS want to do the job as a straight xerox instead of laser printing. Check if they can run card stock through their machines AND what thickness/heaviness their machines can take. Most only can print color onto typing paper and it'll cost you 89 cents to $1.25 per page. Check on reduction of your art, or if YOU have to have it 'camera ready'. Check on cost of lamination or varnishing. Check on cost of corner rounding (they charge per corner, I got a quote of $52 for 30 decks just for that). Check WHO will be the one to cut the cards apart. Check how much to do a back design on them & if they'll match up with the front of the card.
If you go in when nobody else is there, you can lay the project out for the person behind the counter & ask what they'd suggest. Ask to see all their card stock samples--paper 'weight' has nothing to do with stiffness.
The more decks you run off, the cheaper the cost is. Will they do the little white book for you too? Or boxes? In color?
Compare your costs with the ones I put on my posting, I think I put prices up there for nearly everything. It'll give you a base line. Unless they do a color separation type of printing, be prepared for the 'printers' to charge a lot more for the same service you can get over at Kinkos.
