In the month of March, we are offering a special on Retail-Ready DVD’s.  Our Special includes DVD duplication (100 / 250) or DVD replication  (500+) with full-color disc printing, casewrap printed in full-color, DVD album, assembly, shrinkwrap, and all setup fees.   Visit our website for pricing and details:

http://twmedia.com/twms_special_2010_1.htm

Call it Murphy’s Law, fate, or just plain reality — everyone needs their product yesterday.  Here are a few things you need to know in order to avoid rush fees.

When it comes to CD Duplication or DVD Duplication, there are two processes: the printing of the disc, and the duplication of the disc.  It doesn’t matter in which order these are done.  So, as long as you know the quantity needed, we can be printing the disc (while waiting for the master), or duplicating the disc (while waiting for the artwork).  It is not necessary that both components be submitted simultaneously.  When there is a deadline looming, we can certainly get started with whatever you have ready to go.

With CD Replication and DVD Replication, there is a bit more involved, but we can still get the ball rolling. Most importantly, if the master is ready to go, we can get stampers made ahead of time. If the artwork is ready first, we can get proofs approved.

And if you’re adding in the element of Custom Printed Packaging, we can always get that on press ahead of time as well.

Bottomline, we can be working on your job, even if everything isn’t ready to go at all at once. This can save precious time and ultimately money!

It is the Monday after Thanksgiving, and like any other first day back to work after a long holiday weekend, I’m feeling a bit unmotivated.  Thanksgiving was indeed wonderful, though the traditional 4-hour Scrabble tournament still has my head pounding.  I am miserably, horribly, dreadfully, embarrassingly pathetic at Scrabble, but am competitive enough to give it 110%, which makes my perpetual last-place standing all the more painful.  (BTW, “hottie” and “phat” are apparently not real words though “xu “ and “cwm” are… whatever…)  On the bright side, I begin this work week with a slightly expanded vocabulary that I intend to put to use in the remainder of this post  (to validate my Thanksgiving Day Scrabble experience).

Hmmm, I should comment on something informative and relevant to the world of CD and DVD Duplication and Replication and TW Media Services…

Our staff never eats ZA or plays with their BAFFIES near equipment, and they hopefully always mind their p’s and q’s, as well as their XI’S and KOPH’S.  No worries… we rarely ship orders by UMIAK through the CWM.

I hope you have benefitted from this bit of information as much as I did – I managed to kill 12 minutes of what I fear is going to be a dreadfully longish day.  Time to get to work!

Hope you all had a happy and blessed Thanksgiving!

If you ever mail large quantities of individual CD’s or DVD’s, our disc mailer is definitely worth checking out, because it could save you loads on postage. 

When new USPS rates and regulations came down in May of 2007, we responded by creating a cardstock disc mailer that qualifies for the cheaper automation rates.  This mailer is sturdy enough to protect your CD’s through the postal system, yet light-weight enough to qualify for the 1 oz. rate.  We applied for and received official US Postal Service approval of the mailer back then.  And the good news is that, because of this approval, our mailer has been “grandfathered-in” by the USPS even though the regulations have since changed becoming even more stringent.  Consequently, ours is one of the only disc mailers on the market today that allows you the one-ounce automated rate.

For bulk mailings of CD’s and DVD’s, this mailer has saved our clients thousands of dollars in postage.   For more detailed information, visit our online brochure at  http://www.twmedia.com/TW-DiscMailerBrochure.pdf or feel free to give us a call.

Through the years, a substantial part of our business has been built on word-of-mouth.   In appreciation of your generous recommendations, we are instituting a referral incentive program.  For each new CD or DVD Replication client that you send our way, we will thank you with a $50 Visa Gift Card.  Just go to the link on our website, and fill out the form:   http://www.twmedia.com/affiliate.htm.  We will keep you in the loop via email, and will send out your gift card after the first order has been completed and paid for.

As of this week, we are 15-years old!  Not so old in the scope of, well, eternity, but it has been a substantial part of my life and career, and it astounds me how much things can change in 15 years.  I didn’t have a cell phone 15 years ago.  Neither did I have gray hair.  Business was all about VHS and audio cassettes.  The internet was dial-up, exciting, but slow and often frustrating.  We didn’t have Starbucks, though I acquired my daily cappuccino at a lovely coffeehouse that has long since been run out of biz by Starbucks.  (Coffee factors into all of my business memories since I can’t sit down at my desk without a cup…)

And so I find myself reminiscing about dba TW Media Services, originally known as TW Graphics, Inc.  And when I think back, the memories that come to mind are a bit random and scattered… a few crisis situations, but mostly lots of great clients and co-workers.

Most Memorable Jobs…    There was the sizeable rush job that ended up at the bottom of a lake.  The extremely reputable freight company we were using had an extremely intoxicated driver hauling our shipment.  And he somehow managed to navigate his semi into a lake.   (Don’t worry though – the drunk guy lived.  Our product wasn’t so lucky.)  We found out about the accident late in the afternoon (the day before it was due to be delivered), and our crew stayed all night to re-do the job.   We put it on an airplane the next morning and had it couriered to our client for arrival just minutes before needed.    Then there was the bus-wrap we were hired to design for a major-motion-picture promotion.  Not our usual CD and DVD fare, so quite a fun and challenging project.

Memorable Clients…  Many amazingly brilliant, funny, interesting and quirky clients that I could go on and on about, except for the whole “replicator/client privilege” thing.  So, I will refrain.  Michel.  Oops, did I type his name aloud, on the internet no less?  Yes, he has been with us since the early days, and is one of our all-time favorite customers.  He has invoked laughter, tears, heaps of memories, and a few near fatal incidents.

Have to comment on our UPS guy (since I can hear him down the hallway).  He’s a hoot, and goes ridiculously out of his way for us (and ultimately, our clients).  Special trips, extra trips.  Always a skip in his step.  And the daily bantering between him and Cheryl is something worth listening to — not that eavesdropping is necessary — the whole building can hear them.   At any rate, if he ever gets transferred to another route, we’re moving with him.

Co-Worker Memories…      Trace, our beautiful and extremely sensitive graphic designer, who occasionally sheds tears over jobs.  I remember the first time I saw her crying, working at her computer, tears dripping on the keyboard as she cleaned up the blood (in a Photoshop graphic) for a hunting DVD package she was designing.   Bloody animal pictures just aren’t her thing.

Dwight, our warehouse manager, chasing me with a broom because I (unknowingly) dropped a Cheeto on the warehouse floor when walking through.  The way he keeps a warehouse, I had no hesitation picking that darn Cheeto back up and eating it.  In Dwight’s warehouse, the 2-second rule is an unnecessary consideration, cuz he keeps the place really really really clean…

The “steak and beans” contest.  This was just a bad idea.  A sales contest, where the staff was divided into teams among the sales reps.  We booked a restaurant at month end, and closed shop to go to lunch.  The rep with the highest sales for the month and his team got steak and the fixings for lunch.   And everybody else had just a plate of beans.

The memories of Las Vegas… exhibiting at the NAB convention year after year.  Seriously great memories, and finally being able to put faces with names/voices of clients.  Would love to elaborate, but you know, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

The traumatic morning I arrived to find that my Mac had been replaced with a PC.  Only the “creative” staff got to keep their Macs.  Oh, the sense of loss, the grief, that unshakable feeling of vulnerability.  It has been years now, and thanks to the unwaivering support of friends, family and a good IT-guy, each and everyday in PC-land gets a little easier.

I would like to give a huge THANKS to all of the amazing customers who have helped us grow this business through the years.   We wouldn’t be here without you!  Here’s looking forward to the years ahead, the continuing evolution of multimedia technology, and lots more fun!

There are a number of important considerations when setting-up your CD Disc Art or DVD Disc Art.   Be sure to start with the correct template, as the knockout is different between white and silver background discs.    Templates can be found on our website at:   http://www.twmedia.com/templates.htm.   Art should be 300 dpi, and setup in either CMYK, specified PMS, or grayscale.    Make sure to bleed the art through the center ring, and 1/8″ on the outside.  The safe print area is 1/8″ from the center knockout and 1/8″ around the outer edge.  Type shouldn’t be any smaller than 6 point (for white knock-out type), and 5 point (for any other color).   Do not flatten the template to the art — save it on a separate layer.  And if you have any questions, feel free to give us a call!

To charge or not to charge for overages?  That is the question that every replicator must address.  Here is the reality.  Whether your replicator “charges” you or not, you are paying for overages… either outright and upfront, or hidden in the price.

So why do there have to be overages anyway?  Contrary to what some may say, it is not a ”scam-the-customer” tactic, but a common-sense and money-saving practice.  Any given job requires numerous processes — the disc printing, the replication, the printing of the associated packaging materials (inserts, traycards, etc.), and then the assembly aspects.  In an industry where every job is custom and unique, “setup” is a substantial portion of production downtime.  Even with the most stringent quality standards and the best maintained equipment, there will still be that occasional problem — a silkscreening misprint, for instance — when the disc ends up in the trash.   Running a few extra actually saves money, because it alleviates additional downtime for reruns and minimizes production schedule interruptions.  Overruns are necessary to the efficient flow of any manufacturing plant.

But should you have to pay for overages, if they are merely a replicator’s “mistake insurance”?   The reality is that they are a cost of production, and so whether you pay for and receive your overages, or you pay for the exact amount ordered, this cost is in there somewhere.  Be assured though, that as explained above — it is an efficiency practice that ultimately saves money by saving downtime.

How do we at TW Media Services handle overages?  We do charge our customers for overages; however, we strive to keep overruns to a maximum of 2 to 3%.  (Industry standard is 10%).

If you have any questions about our overage policies, please feel free to talk to a sales representative.

The basic difference between DVD-5’s and DVD-9’s is the amount of storage capacity. A DVD-5 is a single-sided and single-layered disc that can hold up to about 2-hours of running time (without special features).   A DVD-9 is a single-sided, dual-layered disc that can hold up to 3-hours, and even more with compression.

TW Media Services is a licensed reseller for Macrovision ACP and Ripguard. For more information about disc copy protection services, please refer to the following page on our website:  http://www.twmedia.com/dvdcopyprotection.htm