Four Postcards per page with Variable Data ????????

[henrynlouisville]

I’m lost. I have no clue how to do what I need to do.
I use VBA to automate report runs for a living and no nothing about printing or printing software. When I fire up InDesign I don’t really understand any of the terms and features.

What I have:
Variable data in a text file
Xerox Phaser 4510N monochrome printer
110 lb Card Stock (200 gsm)
Evaluation copy of Adobe InDesign
Evaluation copy of Quark XPress 7.3/Print Collection

What I need:
I need to print four postcards per page. I will take the sheets to a mail house where they will cut each sheet into 4 postcards, affix postage, and mail. The data is only text - name, address, return address, and message.
The data is variable. I will print out 500 sheets at once. First I will print the mailing address. Then I will turn the stack over and print the message. The message has to match the person on the front.

Questions:
Will InDesign and/or XPress do this?
Do you know what software will?
Do you know the exact steps it would take to get InDesign to do this?

I’m really at a loss…
Thank You!

 

[MVerschuren]

Hi Henry,

If you want to place variable data in Indesign you can use Data-merge function.
To show how it works look at:

http://www.theindesigner.com/blog/episode-43-data-merge-video

If you have any questions, i am glad to help you...
Marcel

 

[apepp]

...yes, data merge allows some level of of variable data printing, the key to success in being how accurate the data you import is...

...with data merge i believe you would have to organize your data into two separate data files, data for front and then data for back being a different import...

...the other option is to use HP Smartstream instead, this allows automatic creation of the reverse, and is much more powerful:

http://h10088.www1.hp.com/cda/gap/display/main/gap_content.jsp?zn=gap&cp=1-247-7722^89726_4000_100__

andrew

 

[apepp]

...the above link is a bad one in my post, you will have to copy and paste the whole line into your web browser...

http://h10088.www1.hp.com/cda/gap/display/main/gap_content.jsp?zn=gap&cp=1-247-7722^89726_4000_100__

andrew

 

[henrynlouisville]

Thank you for the HP software suggestion. I'll try it out.

Do you think that a software solution will handle printing 500 sheets or more at once(2000 postcards when cut). The printer might also have a memory issue with this size.

Someone mentioned that a printer with a built in VDP module would be better. Have you ever seen a small/medium business BW laser printer with this capability?