I would like to add, “… but not by me,” to that, but I share the blame, albeit a much smaller percentage. Hopefully, this will help you to avoid the same mistake.
I mentioned about getting together some framed prints for a contest at the end of this month, and so I selected a quartet (still unsure of which exactly would be entered, since I could only enter 3) from one of the online photo printing services, in this case Winkflash – I’ve used several before, and they was among them. There’s a balance point I try to walk: not too expensive, but quality work and decent turnaround time. Unfortunately, I balanced in the wrong direction this time.
The 11×14 prints arrived in completely inadequate and slackass packaging, an envelope of single-layer cardboard with no stiffener, padding, or any other packaging whatsoever. Moreover, the bold printed “DO NOT BEND” was only on one side, which was the side the idiots chose not to put the mailing label on; you can see that someone wrote it again in pen, which of course guarantees that handlers will pay attention to it. You can also see that the USPS carrier in town bent it to get it into the mailbox, rather than bringing it to the door. This resulted in exactly what you’d expect.
All four prints had two kinks each in them, and if you haven’t had to deal with this yet, kinks in photos simply don’t come out. They will be visible as soon as the light angle gets right, and attempting to flatten them out virtually never works and you can damage the print by trying. This is an extremely well-known hazard of shipping prints, and as such, any reputable company takes steps to ensure that this cannot happen.
To give you an example, below is the package that I received from someone else, containing my dry-mounting pages:
Double-layer corrugated cardboard, six actual sides, next to impossible to bend. Could be marked a bit bolder, which won’t necessarily cause postal workers to give the faintest shit about their job, but it does provide recourse when taking it to the office and inquiring why they hire the grossly incompetent.
One more thing, too. I ordered all prints in glossy, since it’s sharper and retains more detail – “lustre” or “satin” finishes are for snapshots that are handled, not for enlargements, and I’ve found that matte papers are hit-or-miss. I also ordered a single 8×10, and that arrived in a different envelope (also inadequate, but at least it fit in the mailbox) and was probably done at a different lab. It arrived with a cover page in the same paper, so how do the two portions of the order compare?
Well, those sure as hell aren’t the same finish, and when I pointed this out to Winkflash, they maintained that this was ‘glossy,’ but it appears they have two different definitions of the word, and one of which matches the definition of ‘satin’ or ‘lustre’ from every paper manufacturer out there.
There are quite a few companies out there that cut corners everywhere they can and don’t bother themselves with customer satisfaction, much less doing a professional job, in the hopes that the unhappy customer won’t bother pursuing the matter, and this is exactly what that kind of attitude produces. So my advice is, don’t ever buy from incompetent companies such as Winkflash, and go someplace that wants your recurring business and means to keep it.
I originally wrote this earlier, when I’d done the replacement order with a different printer but it hadn’t arrived yet. I’m happy to say that the replacements arrived packaged more than properly, not just the three-dimensional double layer corrugated cardboard shown above, but with a stiffener inside and shrink-wrapped to that (within another envelope, a “glassine” one that’s safe for prints and even negatives.) And they were proper, full-gloss finish as requested. So while I rarely do recommendations here, I have to throw a shout-out to Printique, the printing subsidiary of Adorama Photo, who did an excellent job at a reasonable price and knows exactly what professionalism is – and who I should have used from the start. I have a touchup on a frame to do, but otherwise the prints are mounted and ready to be entered. We’ll see what happens…