Costco - large prints

Out of curiosity I tried some 20"x30" prints at Costco. Normally I order my large prints from ELCO online, but thought it would be nice to try something local. Costco is limited in their sizes and paper options, but their prices and convenience is great, if it fits your needs. After placing the order online, I got 3 hour turnaround for pickup during the Christmas rush!

Things didn't start out well. I first tried a standard 20"x30" on their Fujifilm-Photo Satin paper, printed on an Epson 7880, ~$9 per print. Warning - it takes a bit of careful reading to find and understand which printer profile you need to use, and it's store specific.

The big problem, however, was their inexperienced staff handling of large prints. I showed up at the store while the print was still in the printer bin, and watched as it was thrown around and rolled up. The results - 5 rather significant crimps all around the print! In this store at least, they don't have any space to properly lay out and roll a large print.

I spoke with the manager, no problems in getting credit, and he gave me a number to call, if I wanted to leave a request to not have them roll my print. That could help, but they still don't have any place to properly store the unrolled prints.

So, I gave their PosterBoard prints a try. This is an RC-SemiGloss PhotoBoard, also printed on the Epson 7880. The paper is fused to a 1.3mm thick acid free mount board. It is free of optical brighteners. The only size options are 16"x20" @ $15, or 20"x30" @ $25.

Results: a perfect print with some nice durability. I love the low reflectivity surface. The contrast, dmax and saturations are lower than the Photo-Satin paper, but it still looks great.

Has anyone else tried large prints at Costco. If so:
- What has your eperience been with their print handling?
- Do you use their prnter profiles?
- Do you uprez your files, or do you let their RIP uprez?

I'll bring a few prints to the Shindig next month for anyone interested in seeing a sample of the PosterBoard.

Hi Bill,

I've printed 20x30 at Sams Club. The manager of the photo area allows me back at the monitor and we adjust the print. I then print an 11x14 and if I like it we print a 20x30. After getting the 20x30 to where I like it we then mark the adjustments (contrast etc) on the disk.

Each time I get the print done she makes sure the identical adjustments are made.

Yes, sometimes there is a problem if they leave it in the bin. Also there are times when they try to place more than one print in an envelope at a time. This will scratch the surface so I make sure each print is placed seperately in an envelope. Over all its priced right at under 9.00. Can't beat the price or the convienience. Not all prints work but the ones that do are well worth it.

Bill, I use the Costco in Arvada. There are two women who are the only two I've seen in the photo dept. and they have both been there since the store opened a few years ago. As far as I can tell, they seem to be pretty careful with things, though now that you mention it I don't recall an area to lay the photos out and roll them. I use their custom profiles and have generally been pleased, though for many photos I prefer glossy over the satin that seems to be the only choice for 16X20 or 20X30, and I send those to WHCC. I had one photo several months ago that had crimp marks, but am not sure whether it was the store or due to the way I unrolled the photo.

I do my own up-rezing. I follow the instructions on the Dry Creek photo site explicitely for Costco print and poster prints. This is what they say about poster prints, " Costco's Epson printers is optimized for 300ppi images. Resize your images to 300ppi at one of the supported print sizes listed above. For example, a 16x20 print should be sized to 4800x6000 pixels at 300ppi. Using other dimensions will result in image resizing by the printer driver."

I also do 16X24 prints by creating a white border around the image to a size of 20X30. I'll have to try the PosterBoard prints sometime.

Don, thanks for the Sams Club scoop. That's what I consider premium customer service. They are certainly going far beyond what I would expect from such a large store!

Roger, I also followed all the Dry Creek instructions and didn't take any shortcuts. One of these days I may just send them a straight sRGB file and let their printer resize to see how much of a difference it makes.

In comparison, ELCO explicitly tells you to send them the native file resolution in an unprofiled sRGB file. I've certainly been happy with their prints. They are using Lightjet, not Epson printers, so that may be the big difference in requirements.

Roger & Bill;

I used to use the Arvada Costco for my Frontier/Noritsu prints. Those 3 girls (Amy is one of them) are very cognizant of needs other than typical snapshot printing, and go the extra mile to ensure that we photographers get expected results.

In terms of the printer they operate; an Epson 7880 as you mentioned - I haven't done any printing via this unit, however I did have a long conversation with one of the gals about it, and she did know her stuff. They only use a few papers there so they don't shy too far away from it in terms of profiling. Turns out they calibrate the display every week (and they even do it after hours with the store lights turned down). Furthermore, the unit gets alot of use as it should so print quality should be top notch.

In terms of dpi, I can attest that you are safe at 240dpi if you so choose. The Epson engine operates on a 60dpi multiple - so yes 300 dpi is 5x, but so is 240 at 4x.... and even 180... That is, if you need to up-rez and don't have a super image to begin with.

Now, at that price point, I am sure they are not making too much of a profit with that 7880. I do know they get a little discount on ink, but not much - and paper is not cheap. I do printing for a few people around town (on a multitude of media) using a 9880 (same printer just wider) for quite a bit more than Costco, and still I am not making a profit. So much is to be said for volume....

Happy Holidays everyone!

CR

I had Costco print an 18x24 for me twice, after I had an issue with the way their site aligned my first photo upload. I also had a couple of dimples in the paper from them rolling it up and the general handling of the photo at the Park Meadows Costco.
I just received a 16x48 canvas print from them last Saturday, four days after it was shipped by FedEx 2 day. Costco only put it inside a cardboard box with no protection beside the bag around it. They also had no protection on the ends of the open box besides just the brown packing tape!!! Obviously, it was received damaged at one end, but Costco is supposed to be giving me credit. The woman at the photo department was apalled with how poorly it was packed and was going to show it to the department manager. I also fired off my own letter to their customer service. I'm still waiting to receive my second canvas order of this photo, hopefully before Christmas.
One big gripe I have is that their template for positioning the 19x51 photo (for a 16x48 print) is programmed wrong on their site. The only way that I could (hopefully) get it to work right was to re-edit my photo to include a 2 inch border around three sides of the photo, so that I could control the size in their template. I didn't have this problem when I had a 32x24 canvas print done by them a few months ago. That photo was printed and packed very well, unlike this last one.
Considering the low cost and fast service, if they get their handling and shipping issues resolved, I'll be a happy customer with them.

Hey Jim;

I didn't know they did canvas at Costco..until now. Do you know what they're using? glossy c/v or matte? They MUST charge quite a bit more than the PLPP260. That stuff is not cheap!!!!


Jim, I just realized you had it sent out - to some lab, not in the stores > so my question was answered to some degree. I am wondering though, do they seal the canvas prints for you? Meaning, do they use PrintShield or equivalent laquer product?

thanks

Bill, you probably already know this, but just in case, the normal turnaround I've had is 1 hour. I'm not a huge Costco shopping fan, but can usually find something to do for an hour so I don't have to make two trips.

Christopher,

Costco prints the canvas prints someplace in southern California. They arrive ready to hang and are sealed from moisture and have a UV coating. They have been printed and ready to ship within two business days from when I order.
For example, I reordered my 16x48 canvas print last Saturday afternoon and it shipped on Tuesday. I just checked FedEx and it's on the truck for delivery today. Not bad for $130 ($99+tax+shipping) for 2-day shipping! (Assuming that they packed it well this time.) I'll report back when I open it.

I didn't have any damage to the 20X30 test print I did there, but I wasn't really impressed with the process of working with them or the quality of the paper. In particular, the paper seemed to be easily damaged with any handling. The print was OK, but nothing outstanding. If I needed something in a pinch and up to 20X30 on their one paper choice was OK or the price point was the highest importance, they'll get the job done.

I've recently been working with myphotopipe and I've been really happy with their output and process. I've been having my prints made on RA-4 Fuji Crystal Archive Gloss or more recently Kodak Professional Endura Gloss, all intended for a trip to duraplaq for lamination. The one weakness in RA-4 is that it is difficult to get really bright vibrant and saturated reds and some oranges, but most other colors match the gamut of inkjet pretty well. On the other hand, I think RA-4, particularly the Kodak ones, can produce more natural skin tones and neutrals in many situations and there is never any gloss differential or any bronzing. I've had 7 30X40 prints made and they all arrived without damage and I'll have another 3 or four ordered soon. I probably won't be bringing any of those to the shindig though.

I received my 16x48 canvas print from Costco this afternoon. It was packed just as poorly as the first one that I received damaged last week. Only by pure luck was this one not damaged. Also, anyone not knowing in advance that the print was right up against the paper tape at the ends of the box, would certainly cut the print trying to cut the box open.
Otherwise, the canvas print looks great. Until Costco hires someone that has a clue about properly packing and shipping something, I can't recommend them for at least the 16x48 inch canvas prints unless you are a gambling person.

Isn't the green in Fuji products an indication of their ability to reproduce greens best, versus Kodak's yellow packaging, presumably? I recall Kodak Endura being very warm which works well for some images.

In the inkjetting world, I am curious if different papers out there reproduce wider color gamuts (like their silver counterparts), if you will, than others. The paper substrate / ink laydown method based on the paper profile would drive this, most likely. Maybe someone can enlighten me.

So I got a little cagey lately, and swapped out my 7880 for a 9880. Looks great in the living room too.

FYI the printer needs to be run often to keep the heads from clogging. hint hint.

The Fuji Crystal Archive RA-4 papers could have a Fuji sort of look to them. But when run on a properly profiled system, it seems to normalize the Fuji and Kodak papers so that they look remarkably close to each other, especially in the real world color range. I ran some images with steps on Kodak and Endura Lustre VC and Fuji CA Gloss, and both look very similar except and the ends (ie 255,0,0). If anything, I'd say the Fuji base is a little warmer between these two specific papers.

Don't read anything into the color of the Fuji and Kodak boxes. Each individual film base has a unique palette and strengths and weaknesses. Velvia produces a unique and appealing green, but so do many Kodak films.

The paper Costco is using is an inkjet paper, presumably Fuji-made (its not marked), not a traditional photographic paper. So there is no color palette inherent in this system, just the inkjet's gamut interacting with the paper.

I tried Costco Park Meadows, a few months ago and wasn't very pleased whatsoever; print quality and service was just horrible.

Discovered Myphotopipe, out of Atlanta, and never looked back.

Roger, I didn't think they would do the large prints within an hour, so that is good to know.
However, I much prefer to submit the files online and know that they will be done when I arrive.

I picked up my second batch of posterboard prints yesterday. This time I included an image with a more challenging range of colors. Well, I was very happy with the colors and print quality. However, their print head apparently had a clogged blue nosel which resulted in a wonderful grid of evenly spaced white lines across the entire sky.

You would think that the operator would immediately reject this print, clean up the clog, and the customer would never know. To my amazment, the person running the register didn't even see a problem until it was pointed out. I just hope they didn't have too many customers that morning with blue skies! I'll have to wait until next week for a reprint because they ran out of posterboard paper.

OK, lesson learned. Checking out Costco during the Christmas rush was a bad idea.

My results so far:
- Submitting the files online is simple and easy.
- The turnaround is incredibly fast and convenient.
- Their printer profiles seem to work very well.
- If you are not satisfied for ANY reason, they are happy to reprint or refund.
- I really like the durability and quality of their posterboard prints
- Their procedure for handling large prints, on regular paper, is so bad that I won't bother wasting my time.

Obviously, from the comments in this thread, the service and results vary widely between stores and specific products.

Bill,

I'm surprised that you were able to make large prints locally. My costco only goes up to 12x18"; everything else is mail-order and drop-shipped from Fuji, by my experience. I haven't found a way to assign profiles for any of the mail-order printing, so I've only done it a couple of times. I'll have to look again...

Mark,

I don't know if Costco plans to upgrade all their stores to offer the same service. I wouldn't be surprised if they vary depending on what the local market can support.