alternative to Indesign Data Merge

[pspdfppdfxhd]

We've been using Indesign quite a bit for Data Merge in mailing jobs. Names, addresses, Salutations etc.

Recently we've picked up some big jobs of 300,000 plus pages. We export the pdfs out of Indesign and print them to a black and white laser printer. We don't do all 300,000 at once, the first one required 73000 pages, but we are finding that Indesign is really choking to get that many pages out.

Add to this the fact that the customer would not remake the file with the control code that we needed and after the pdf is exported I'm adding them in pitstop and boy is that taking long. An hour and counting and it's only about half way done. The data is in .txt format and I know I could add a counter column in excel for the control code but am having problems doing that.

Is a plugin like fusion pro going to help here? Any advice appreciated.

[swampymarsh]

You are going to have to do the ROI on struggling through with InDesign vs. investing in industrial strength variable data software that may or may not be targeted at mailing.

Firstly, when using InDesign – let master pages do the heavy lifting, not the merge:
http://prepression.blogspot.com.au/2015/03/indesign-fast-data-merge.html

If your DFE/RIP offers a variable data mode where it only needs to RIP the static elements once and it can then combine the variable data with the static data, use it. Again, less work for the variable data engine upstream. One basic example is EFI Fiery Freeflow.

[swampymarsh]

I can't comment on the following products, however you will need to weigh various factors such as ease of use, price, stand alone or plug-in, merge speed, output formats and output speed/size, bar codes and mail codes, imposition options etc. Some of the solutions are from digital press hardware vendors, so you may be able to leverage your existing hardware investment.

http://rpp.ricoh-usa.com/products/software/variable-data-printing/pti-fusionpro-vdp-creator
http://www.objectiflune.com/
http://www.jetletter.net
http://www.xmpie.com
http://www8.hp.com/us/en/commercial-printers/indigo-presses/creation-solutions.html

And some more to follow...

[swampymarsh]

http://www.gmc.net/en/gmc-inspire/r10-introduction/
http://www.meadowsps.com/site/main/designmerge.htm
http://www.accuzip.com/
http://www.bccsoftware.com/bcc-mail-manager/
http://www.uccsoft.com

And probably many more, good luck!

[prepress2]

I've been using FusionPro for over 5 years now and strongly recommend you looking into it. It works within Acrobat but also has plugins for Indesign and Quark. I regularly work mail merges and variable letters for our indigo press and docutechs without a problem. I've also used it to merge large bus. card orders with not only varying text but also art & images. It is a bit of a learning curve but there's extensive information and support on Marcom's site http://marcom.com/fusionpro/.

It also exports to .jlt files for our indigo (needed as it's rip chokes on pdfs with a lot of pages), so it allows me to get away from HP's software which I find just too tunnel visioned toward their presses. Of course I haven't dealt with HP software for 6 years or more so they might have changed their attitude.