I called my printer this am and asked for a quote to high-speed copy 200 copies of 48 pages and assemble using plain paper. He said it would be 760.00. Good luck.

Critter - who did you use? We also had BW books, but 68 pages and on a nice glossy stock with full color cover, and they cost about 12 per book when we purchuse 250 of them. We are pretty much forced to use the school photographer for this because they have all the kids pictures. I am open to exploring other options.

As far as the "printer guy" (in the original question), here are my comments.
- IF he did them in-house at his shop, they did not cost 12 per book for BW copies. I work for an agency and to run something off the BW High-speed copier, it is CHEAP to do. Think about it - if you went to kinkos and paid .05 per page, and collated, and stapled yourself it would be about $2-3 per book. You got ripped off (vs the quality/price).
- Talk to him now, don't wait. No one wants to fix something long after it is done. If he's a professional, he'll see what he can do and will probably already be expecting someone to say something. He should talk to his management, let them know how unsatisfied the PTO is, and I would almost guareentee they would adjust billing for you at actual cost. I've worked with printers that have done it for free to save face. You could have a lot of bad PR for them, let alone the tainting of this guys name if they did not make it right. He will want to do something about it (if he can).
- Be ready to address it with the parents. Be straight forward with them about the facts: 1. The parents that volunteered dropped the ball and it did not get done so the PTO could not have it done by the appropriate company. Don't give their names, it's irelevant. 2. Let them know another parent stepped in and said he'd help out (remind them it was with a MONTH to do it). 3. He did what he could, and that's all you can ask. 4. Hopefully you will have already addressed it with the dad, and gotten something back that you can offer back to the parents and say: We've addressed the quality as it is less than what we originally would have got from the yearbook company, but that's what we got. We will be issing everyone back $5.50 which where we eventually came in with the parent that got it done for us at the last minute (if that is what it is). Make is sound good for the dad too - he did try to help out, good intentions are better than what you got from the first two parents.
- If they don't adjust the invoicing (first of all - they suck), but I'd see what profit you make on your school pictures and still kick something back to the parents. You are afterall a business, and sometimes you need to take a hit in order to move forward.

The best you can do is try and make it right as possible. And, no matter what you do, there will still be parents that complain (I am sure you've figured that out long ago).

Good luck!

Try not to beat yourself up over this. You entrusted your committee chairpeople and they let the whole school down, not just the PTO officers. They may even be just as embarrassed as you, but afraid to admit it for the intense disappointment they feel.

Your idea of recruiting a new chair is clever. So...if someone really complains, they can be part of the solution next year.

By the way, we changed yearbook companies this year and worked directly with a local company that does school photographs. Not to gloat, but our full-color (yes, every page is color), soft bound 40 page yearbook cost $9.40 each. Ok, so for years we suffered with crummy quality BW books, but this year we had a chairperson who looked outside the box. Good luck!

I am so embarrassed about our yearbooks we are passing out tomorrow I'm nearly sick.

I want to refund all money but some say that would open up more problems.

We assigned 2 women to take the task of organizing the yearbook last Fall. The info from 'Membory Book' came and I passed it on to one of the women. I received 2notices "deadline is ____" and I passed them on. Around March we received a letter stating the deadline had passed.

I spoke to the women and they said they didn't know anything about it and were sorry. Oh well! OH WELL! I was MAD.

So the pres and I scrambled to find SOMEONE to create a yearbook. During our scramble, one of the parents piped up "My husband can do it through his printing company and it will look better then last years". We gave her the budget and started collecting candid photos. In May we began proofing. All the while receiving BW copies to make our corrections. We were just thrilled not to have to try and find someone and to a lot of legwork. WRONG decision!

Our books have been done in BW for the past few years and we were prepared for that. The guy went over budget and ended up charging us over $12.00/book. We received the books the other day and they are terrible!

I took them to a printer in town and he said they were done on a high speed copier not a printing press. The paper was like printer paper not gloss or heavyweight. He gave me a quote to do the books next year at $6.50/book. The books look like they could have been done at Kinko's! We haven't approached the man who did the printing because his daughter is graduating tomorrow and wanted to wait until next week. We live in a small town and he has a 2nd grader at the school. We are just torn as to what to do.

Unfortunately I feel like we should be prepared for those parents who are going to say something to us about the quality. I'm trying to be PC about the whole thing but my problem that I can't seem to let go of is . . . this is the last taste in the mouth of parents of a PTO project for this year. We have worked SO hard to gain back trust and involve more parents this year. I feel it will hinder our parent involvment next year if they remember how PTO 'scammed' them out of $10.50 for a crummy book.

Maybe I'm just too close to the whole thing and it will be fine. I'm sending out the books tomorrow with a slip of paper in them stating "The yearbook committee has an open position for chairperson next year. Please volunteer for this committee in the Fall. Contact . . ." Saying but NOT saying "we realize these books aren't up to par, and if you can do a better job please do".

I want to crawl in a hole!