Print out address labels

[chris ashdown]

Is there any other software apart from mole end that can print out address labels?

Thinking of giving up on courier service and going to smart stamps but need to be able to just type in order number and have address printed off on a dyno printer label

Jans answer is a bit over the top for what I want

[wjcampbe]

Chris,

There is a section in Advanced Guide about adding your own reports to Actinic - but this carries a warning that you cannot tie the report to ther current order.

But, if you create an Access report, that asks you to select a value then prints according to that value....

(I would use a copy of the database while experimenting with this. :) )

[george]

My staff has been hassling me to get a Dyno labeller for regular address labels (from Actinic). Never really spent anytime investigating this, possibly due to customers lack of Capitalisation, etc. This easy enough done?

Sorry to interupt Chris, but I thought that could answer your query would probably already use the Dyno for labelling. Maybe you do yourself?

[chris ashdown]

At present I am using City Link and a small piece of software from Transparent Communications That works by just entering the last few digits of the order number, Telling it what site (if multi web sites) and it then picks the address and sends it to the city Link software to print out the details

Whole process takes about 15 sec for each one

I am looking for something along the same lines but just to print out the address onto these small dymo printers, which should save on labels etc

[wjcampbe]

Chris - if you want to email me the label dimensions from the dymo printer, I can throw something together that should work.

Ready to give it a try if you are.

[chris ashdown]

Dear Bill

Thanks for your offer,

I have not yet brought one of these printers as I am trying to find out if we can use it to print out address envelope labels from actinic before i purchase

I understand the machine is a Dymo and the max width of the labels is 59mm with most labels brought at either 28mm x 89mm or 36mm x 89mm

They can also be used to print out the smart stamps and connect via USB

[wjcampbe]

OK Chris, I'll have a look.

[fleetwood]

I think the Dyno labellers look nice, and I'm sure they work, but I hate the idea being forced into buying over priced consumables. Don't the labels work out at about 4p each, which whilst not a lot, is totally OTT for a single sticky label.?

[wjcampbe]

Hmm,

This turned out to be a PITA. Easy enough to create an Access report sized at 28mm x 89mm and to get the name and address set out and printed within this area, but no way of calling the report from Actinic - turns out that can only be config'd to call Crystal Report rpt files.

Running a small Access window and positioning that over the top of the Actinic window I can type the Order Number in, but not cut and paste from the Actinic Orders screen, and that is a cludge.

[buspassjohn]

Is there any other software apart from mole end that can print out address labels?

Thinking of giving up on courier service and going to smart stamps but need to be able to just type in order number and have address printed off on a dyno printer label

Jans answer is a bit over the top for what I want
Using a Dymo would be exceedingly expensive to run, you must have a laser printer, if not they are less than £100, put this together with the Mole End solution and you get an invoice or packing list complete with 1 or 2 labels, formatted address at very low cost in time or effort.
No typing, just put in weight and service to your Smart Stamp console.
If this solution is too expensive, should you really be considering if the game is worth the candle?

[chris ashdown]

I have run a check on costs and the mole end paper comes in at just under 5P per label, whilst the dymo is at 2.1p per label

The mole-end solution works fine so I am told, but would cause me a problem in that I do not want invoices sent out with a "hole" in them even though there is backing paper, and as I print out two copies of each invoice ( one for my records and another for the client) the costs mount up, as some invoices are single page and others two or more pages you can not for instance place one plain sheet and one moleend sheet alternatively in the printer as they would soon get out of sinc.

I have come up with a simple solution in that when I send out the goods and print the invoice I also send out a email, I should be able to cut and past the name and address from this email to the Dymo

If anyone has a dymo, could they check this out for me please

Its just a case of looking at saving at the front end where available

[buspassjohn]

We use two cheap laser printers, one for the delivery note (plain paper) and one for the mole end invoice or delivery note with the peel off labels (1 for del address, 1 for our return address).
The cost of the stationery is far less than the cost of the labour to type addresses or cut & paste.
The other benefit is that it does it all unattended!!

[fleetwood]

Chris
We use cut and paste from the email into a simple label template set up in Word.
Takes seconds to do, and is not labour intensive, although I suppose it depends how many orders you process in a day (we average 15-20 orders a day and its no problem).

The Word template is set up with our return address, and a blank line set to our preferred font for labels, and has 10 pre set labels per sheet. We keep this on the desktop.
After we print the invoice, its simply a matter of selecting an email (any will do as they all have the customers address on), and cut and paste from here to the Word doc. We repeat for as many orders are at hand.
We print out on plain paper and simply tape the labels on.

No, its not as efficient as automated printed invoice/labels, but it works, our labels look professional, and cost around 0.25p or less.

As you quite rightly point out, protecting margins by cutting down waste is crucial to running an internet store. Things are going to get more and more competitive for most of us, and I firmly believe in the old saying "if you look after the pennies.....".

[chris ashdown]

Thanks martin

Thats my attitude

As I have said we are at present using some software from Transparent that when you type the last few digits of the order number it gets the data from access (Actinic) and sends the address date to clan software which prints out the city-link labels(total time start to finnish about 15 seconds each one.

Before i ditch this system for the Royal Mail (far cheaper than city-link) for a large number of items we send, I need to have in place a system that equalls this for speed, price and convenience, The Dymo also appears to be able to print out the smart stamps so hence the initial enquiry

We are not much higher than you on daily sales, but would prefer not to cut and paste if possible and do not see the point in buying an add-on if you are not using most of the features most of the time, "I like keep it simple"

Anyway thanks all who have contributed, given me great food for thought

[Dr John William]

I have set up two dymo label writers one for smart stamp and the other for regular shipping labels. I have created different label versions with the return address either horizontal on the top or vertically on the side. Quite easy to do and the same label design can be used within any application to print a label. The address details can be stored

Highlighting the name and address details from an email then quickly enables the label to be printed. It would be useful if there was tight integration between Smart Stamp, Labelwriter and Dymo. So that a quick click would send a print instruction to the label writer.

All in all I recommend the solution

[buspassjohn]

I guess our difference is that we also have a very busy shop to run with hundreds of sales per day, if we only had the online sales to deal with we'd be looking for labour intensive solutions to fill up the day. Oh for such luxury!

[Jan]

Hi Chris,

We can supply dymo label printer reports from Actinic, they are not on our website but we have them, they cost around £75 depending on what is required, as far as I know these little printers work really well, the only issue that I have been told about is that on high volume sites they can wear out quite quickly.

Regards,

[siwalker]

Chris, FWIW, we've just gone down the route of trying to streamline our order processing. We were using SmartStamp to generate address labels and stamps - printing to a laser printer on cheap 14/sheet labels. Low-cost but very fiddly and error-prone - especially finding the customer address to copy and paste into SmartStamp. How hard would it have been for Actinic to implement a right-click option on an order line to copy the address to the clipboard?

We went for integrated labels from Mole End, which work fine, though I can see a Crystal Reports purchase coming on to tweak the invoices a bit.
re: your issue with second page on normal paper: most printers that have two paper trays - ie. most lasers - will happily print the first page of any job from the manual feed tray and subsequent pages from the internal tray - or vice versa. If only Actinic would remember printer settings based on job (invoice/delivery note/etc) it would be a real snap - unfortunately you have to then change printer settings when printing packing notes again.

That sorted the address label problems and we then purchased a Dymo LabelWriter 330 Turbo for under £100. Using SmartStamp with this just to print postage is very fast. Cost per label is around 2p.

We're probably saving a minute or two per order using this system. The extra cost per order is around 5p.

Cheers,
simon
Cult Pens (http://www.cultpens.com)