East Van Graphics

Super condescending customer service. Terrible and very confusing website. A cocky too-​cool-​for-​school attitude that can only come from someone who either hates their job or hates dealing with customers.

I NEVER write bad reviews but in this case it is necessary. There was no option for no stars — this is probably the WORST PLACE TO DO BUSINESS. I have never been treated so rudely in my LIFE. I was specific to what I wanted in my order, I am from the US, and we are doing an event at Slam Dance in Canada and so we needed our theatrical poster printed. They were horrible about communicating, they never called us back when they said they would, they didn’t follow any of our instructions, and when I tried to explain to JEFF (THE MOST UNPROFESSIONAL PERSON I HAVE EVER MET) he cursed at me, belittled me, and then hung up the phone. Instead of trying to be courtesy to the customer, the whole time he was rude and uninformative. PLEASE DO NOT GO TO THIS PLACE _​IT WILL BE A MISTAKE!!!

These guys are super awesome. I dealt with them numerous times when I was working in events planning for arts/​culture groups. They have fast turn-​around, great prices, and even a discount for non-​profits. I also appreciated that I could do short digital print runs and they wouldn’t charge me an arm and a leg (*cough*clubcard*cough*). East Van Graphics even called me when my order was done and would deliver if needed.

East Van Rules!
I had a recent project requiring a quick turnaround — 300 funeral/​memorial cards.
I got a quote from a supplier I’d used previously for the same purpose (4 colour, digital) and then, after a cursory search online, decided to get another quote from East Van Graphics. I liked the sound of their name, and they were friendly and personable on the phone, assuring me it would get done in time, unlike the other place who had a new ‘rush’ charge for such projects, had raised their prices, and didn’t seem to care about such a small job.
I sent EastVan the files, nervous about using an unknown entity. If anything went wrong, there’d be no time for fixing things, given the fixed ‘deadlines’ of funerals. Plus, I was worried that the soft palette I’d used would print too dark, and that the dodgy/​old/​not optimum photos I’d used would not turn out.
To my great relief, the cards turned out great! The pale hues were perfectly subdued, and the images were fine — even the skin tones looked good. Most impressively, they were all perfectly scored, folded, boxed and ready for pickup before my deadline. I was able to pick them up the night before, as they’re open till 8pm.
I’ll definitely use them again, and not just because I was born and raised in East Van.
They do good work for a good price.

I adore these guys.
Have my postcards occasionally arrived with a fraction slightly askew? Sure.
Are the colours sometimes a tad off? Like a twinge of green in a brown, or a slightly warped sepia? Maybe.
Have these guys bailed me out of every printing related emergency in the last three years, and done so cheerfully and still at a fraction of the price of anyone else in town?
Yup. Yup they have.
Ok. So their office isn’t the swankinest and sometimes when I arrive, they have no idea where my order is, or it still has to be cut and I have to mingle around for 15 minutes.
But you know what? I don’t care.
Most of the jobs I’ve sent them in the last two years arrived mere hours before I needed them, with notes reading «Pppppllleeeaaassseee? For the love of god — please help me!». When I needed 1000 burlesque posters in 6 hours? Handled. When I needed a 20 ft poster of a visual illusion in three hours, with an incorrect file size, the day before New Years Eve? They not only bailed me out, but they made me a back up copy in case I tore the first one because they would be closed the day after.
They have never, EVER let me down. And though there’s occasional wonkiness, it’s just that — occasional. Most of the print jobs have been spot on. The only thing I don’t use these guys for is business cards. Other then that — posters, postcards, handbills, tickets? Fair game. And cheaper then Staples.
A grand and excited tip of the hat to these service ninjas! Thanks guys!

One of our non-​profit clients already had a relationship with this printer; much of our work got sent to East Van for printing. In our client’s words, «they’re cheap.»
Print jobs have been consistently poor. Proofs come back with the wrong page order (there’s page numbers, it just takes a few seconds to check before showing it to us, guys!) Sloppy trimming where flyer cards aren’t even the same size. Inconsistent colour. Any time any of this is brought up, the staff at East Van have blamed us (the designers) and our files.
Fine. It’s cheap, you get what you pay for. But if you don’t impress me on a small job, why would I ever recommend you to all my other clients for a big job? Especially after you’re rude and defensive to me when I point out sloppy work?
There’s too many printers and print shops in this city, to deal with laziness and poor quality, no matter what the discount.

Just did my first printing job with these guys the other day and am a bit torn on how many stars to give them. I’ll definitely try them out again, but i don’t think i’ll ever use them for any of my clients who are more uptight or white collar. (And don’t give me any bullshit about it being called east van and it not being for white collar customers… This place is a few blocks from the yuppie restaurants and condos of main street and is juuuuust on the border of being in the west end of Vancouver!)
Some clients of mine needed some simple business cards to give out as customer loyalty cards (get ten stamps and get 25% off, that sort of thing) and we went with East Van Graphics because they offered by far the best price. Cheaper doesn’t necessarily mean better, especially when it comes to printing, but for this job the quality didn’t matter as much as cost, so it was the perfect opportunity for me recommend my clients to them so i could try these printers out for the first time.
I had a meeting with the clients today and got to see how they cards turned out. They look awesome and both my client and I were really happy with how the cards turned out! Based on that, i’ll definitely be keeping these guys in mind for future print jobs!
However…
My clients were the ones who went to pick up the order, and it was the rather painful story they told me today that has me hesitating to send all my clients to them… Apparently when they went to pick up the order they had to wait 30 minutes while the people working there tried to find the cards. My client told me the office was REALLY messy (pop bottles everywhere, junk lying around) and that in the end they couldn’t find the cards, so they asked my client to come back the next day. The next day they had them, but my client thought they might have just had to reprint the job! My client didn’t say anything about them being unpleasant to deal with or anything, just that seemed like laid back stoners! In my email correspondence with them they were also really pleasant and fine to deal with… and personally, i’d rather deal with nice people who are a bit more laid back than stuck up assholes!
So i’ll definitely use these guys again… but I have a few clients who i just can’t send to a messy, unorganized office because they’d kill me if they showed up at a printer and their job was missing! I’m hoping these guys were just having a bad week and their facilities improve since their prices and the quality of work were great!

what service, what pricing, my favourite printer in the universe.