While work on the first issue of 2020 is well underway, we paused to see which PostPress articles from 2019 caught the eyes of our readers. The following five articles were the top reads from 2019 for visitors to the website.

1. 10 Time-Consuming Tasks You Should Automate Now

Let’s face it, your business has fundamentally changed over the past few years. You now have dozens, if not hundreds, of “micro” orders coming into the shop every day: short-run jobs that customers expect at a very fast turnaround time. You hear the constant message to “automate now,” but struggle with where to start. Here are 10 areas where your business can benefit from automation right now.

2. Finishers Explore New Opportunities in the Cannabis Industry

The rise of cannabis legalization in the US and Canada has made way for auxiliary industries to capitalize on increased needs from cannabis brands – including packaging. “It’s a ‘Wild West’ scenario with many jumping on cannabis’ momentum, which creates a surplus of emerging brands, especially in the CBD space which already is legal to sell nationwide,” said April Lytle, marketing coordinator at KURZ Transfer Products.

3. Q&A: Solving Challenges with Perfect Binding

Perfect binding is an economic, attractive way to present information in a bound format for both short and long runs. Once viewed as a binding method for thick books or publications, perfect binders today are designed for quick turnarounds and much shorter runs, especially for the ever-growing digital world. And, it now is feasible to perfect bind page counts as low as 32 – or even less.

4. “A Baugh Christmas Story,” by D.E. Baugh Co.

In the window of a two-story house on Cleveland Street in Hammond, Indiana, circa 1940, sits a lamp emitting a gentle light against a snowy backdrop – though it is no ordinary lamp. With “the soft glow of electric sex gleaming in the window,” the leg lamp prop used in “A Christmas Story” has become well-known since the movie debuted on Thanksgiving in 1983. This popular icon of the well-loved movie made its way onto the 2018 Christmas card from D.E. Baugh Co.

5. Q&A: Laminating Films

The decision to add a laminating film to a printed product has become much more than just protecting the piece from moisture or other outside elements. Today, there are a variety of choices to add specialty effects or special tactile surfaces with film lamination. PostPress sat down with Jeff Truan of Nobelus to ask a few questions on the current landscape for film laminations.