There are several factors that go into the cost of a perfect binding machine. These factors might seem obvious to those who are in the bookbinding industry, but many are not aware of them. Even people in the printing industry, which is tightly associated with bookbinding, don’t have a clue to what they are looking for. Hopefully this article gives a little bit of insight to the factors that go into perfect binding machines and the price.

The first factor most people have to consider with perfect binding is the volume of work that a machine can put out. I typically like to classify perfect binding books into three classes. You have low volume books that are very custom made. You have medium volume books that are still generally shorter in volume size (say a few hundred or so). Then you have the high end volumes that are many thousands in terms of quantity.

With all of the above perfect book binding job sizes listed above, machines are designed for those types of books. You can spend a couple hundred dollars on a very low end perfect binding machine and typically everything will need to be hand powered. This type of bookbinding actually is very close to thermal binding but the bookbinder will need to determine what they need. A medium range perfect binding machine could be several or tens of thousands of dollars. These machines are typically great for small run setups. The machine is generally easy to setup and tear down for different types of jobs. However the downfall of these machines is that they are still slower when it comes to high volumes of books.

The top of the line machines can cost several millions of dollars. Typically most people won’t have the capital to invest in these types of machines and only really big printers or bookbinderies can venture into this area. Even then, it is still a scary move for either. They still have to have the workflow to merit this type of perfect binding tool and they might have to get work from several states in the surrounding area.