T206 Print Groups-A Quick Overview

[steve B]

I suppose I may as well go against the grain here as well.

Assuming Scot Readers estimate of 370 million produced and the larger sheet of 34 subjects X 5 of each for a 170 card sheet that's nearly 2.2 million impressions. At 1000 sheets an hour that's about 54 weeks of work per color just to print the cards. Or about 7-9 Years of labor depending on how many colors you think were used including backs.

In other words ALC must have been running the T206s on multiple presses at the same time.
Even assuming a large sheet.
Even cutting the estimated production in half it still would have required multiple presses operating simultaneously.

So while they were packed and distributed based on some known dates the printing most likely was ongoing with multiple backs being printed at the same time.


Steve B
PS: I know, the time required to print is another solid argument for a larger sheet. There's also a technical issue of balancing the time to print against the time to cut and package. Larger sheets of small things require a lot of cutting time. But small sheets take more printing time. Someday I'll have to ask someone I know if threre's a formula.