Laser Printer that can print onto postcards

My missing link for a website advertising campaign.

[Jeremy_H]

Here's something I've been wondering...

As part of my website advertising, I'm looking to mail out postcards.

I'm looking for a laser printer that I can feed standard-weight postcards so I can print the addresses onto them.

I've been looking around for a while, but haven't found any luck. Typically, the printers don't have a rear output, or their take-up tray is at too steep of an angle to grab the card.

Any first hand experience and recommendations?

Thanks

[LifeinAsia]

No personal experience with trying to laser postcards, but I frequently get postcard jumk mail with the address printed on them (I assume with a laser printer, although it could have been ink jet).

As an option, you can always print sheets of address labels and transfer them to the postcards. One more step, but it works (as can also be seen in my daily pile of junk mail).

[bcc1234]

If you are in the US, then pay USPS to do all that. They have partner companies that would print everything and mail it out.

It's much easier (and cheaper) than doing it yourself.

[Jeremy_H]

Both very good suggestions, thank you.

One thing I planned on doing in this campaign is to pull the information out of a MySQL table, allowing the copy to vary by users as its being printed at the same time the address is being printed. I could then update the table to reflect the printing time.

Other things I could do would be adding a unique code or web address to these printouts. Then, when/if the user accesses that page, I would know exactly when the item was mailed and when it was received. I'll also be able to write a cookie (or log their ip) and associate their name and mailing address with any site activity from their computer.

I could then see how well/effective sending to any given recipient is, and base further mailings off that.

I'm very excited about these capabilities, but the only link I'm missing is the ability to print onto the postcards.

Unfortunately, I'll need a printer that can print directly onto the card, and not onto the labels.

[Broadway]

I have an old HP4L laser printer. You would have to feed the postcard pages in one at a time but it does have a path that feeds the paper straight through.

[jsinger]

Slightly off topic:

We've decided to step up our print advertising, something I've been away from for about 10 years.

I'm amazed by some of the nifty online full color discount printing sites. Even if you don't use them for printing, you can price your print job online to get an idea of what it might cost locally.

On quantities of 1,000 pieces, our local Minuteman franchise is cheaper and faster, but above that the online sites win out.

Prepare the art in Microsoft Publisher (or whatever), upload to the printing company as a PDF (or many other formats) and get your brochures or mailers in 7 to 10 days. Some will do the mailing for you.

Anyone using online printing for 4-color quality printing? Any tips? Warnings?