In-line vs. Off-line Finishing: The Eternal Question

With the growth of digital print, lots of consideration goes into designing the optimum finishing process. And with this, lots of ill-considered advice is dispensed!

The first reaction of many digital print vendors is "don't put anything on the end of my press!" This would have been solid info in the offset world. Web offset presses were not designed for short runs, and adding an in-line finishing system makeready to a press makeready could add many hours (if not a day or so) to the process. In-line finishing was quite common in the direct mail world, but you had to have a run of a million pieces or so to make it viable.