Martin Yale BCS212 Review

There are many small print shops and large businesses out there that could benefit from the ability to produce their own business cards quickly, easily, and on demand. The Martin Yale BCS 212 presents you with a great option for cutting business cards that are designed in the 12-up layout. We took a closer look at this machine, and here we give you what we consider to be its strengths and weaknesses.

Strengths:

1. For on-demand business card applications, the BCS212 excels. It is a remarkably fast cutting machine, able to process three hundred seventy five business cards in one minute, which translates to a thousand in less than four minutes. We think those are pretty impressive numbers.
2. Because the blades that the BCS212 uses are semi-self sharpening, you will in all likelihood be able to use the BCS212 without changing blades for years to come. If you ever do need to replace a blade, however, supplies are available through most Martin Yale retailers.
3. Another of the BCS212's capabilities that we appreciated is that it can accept a stack of sheets that is up to 5/8" in thickness. This means that more often than not, you will be able to place your cards into the machine and simply let it go to work. If letter sized sheets are what you are using, there are two steps to the process, however if you are working with a four-up layout, you can complete the process in just one simple step.
4. The BCS212 worked well (as it was intended to) with high-quality color printed and copied material. As such it is a great choice for small run copy shops or medium to large businesses that can and do design their own 12-up layout cards, and want to be able to process them and get them ready to use quickly, easily and relatively cheaply.
5. The twelve up layout is great and it allows users to get twenty percent greater productivity out of every sheet of printed cards. However, creating full bleed cards using this machine is almost impossible. If that application is important to you, you should look at a machine that does 8 up full bleed cards or use a 10-up machine to create six-up full bleed cards.

Weaknesses:

1. While the BCS212 does have paper guides that are adjustable, allowing you to make small changes in the feeding of your documents, it is a twelve-up machine, and will only work with documents that are designed in that format. Do not purchase the BCS212 with the thought that you may be able to cut customized sizes. In fact, the machine really doesn't offer the ability to adjust the cutting blades. If you want to adjust how the machine cuts your cards you will probably have to adjust how they are printed on your page.
2. You probably know that some of the larger business card cutters out there on the market have the ability to score and/or perforate documents, which can add an aesthetic element to business cards that some people might prefer. The BCS212 does not have the ability to do either. If you think that this is something you will require of your business card slitter, you should take a look at the Intimus BCS412, which will give you those abilities.
3. Laminated papers were a bit of a problem with the BCS212. We were able to finally figure it out but it really took some doing. This isn't a really common application and the BCS212 did just great with all the heavy and/or coated stocks that we threw at it.

Recommendation:

Overall, we feel that the BCS212 is a lot of machine for the money. It doesn't take up much room in an office or production room and its capabilities are top notch.

If you are interested in purchasing the Martin Yale BCS212 Tabletop 12up Business Card Slitter for your office or print facility, you should really check out MyBinding.com. They offer a great price on this machine and they even offer Free Shipping on all orders over $75. Plus, they carry a huge selection of other Business Card Slitters and paper handling equipment from manufacturers such as MBM, Martin Yale, Intimus, Formax, Challenge and Dynafold. Check them out today!