A rather fetching mini-catalogue from clothing company Toast arrived in my post recently.
While admiring its handy A5 format and the skilful prepress that showed off the rather ethereal photography (also harmoniously combined with the uncoated stock used), I noticed to my surprise and delight that a printer's credit appeared on the outside back cover: "Printed by Westdale Printing Group".
How often does one see such a thing? Not often enough to my mind. Having consulted with Westdale MD Alan Padbury he recalled that when he first came into the trade it was standard practice for a printer to just drop in their credit on the page, and there was no question of even asking a customer's permission "it was absolutely the norm". Nowadays while some clients are happy for such a thing to appear (such as Toast), and may even request it, it seems the majority don't give permission - especially if the client is a print management company.
What a shame, I would love to see a return to more detailed colophons explaining who's produced something along with the typefaces and paper in use. I enjoy spotting this sort of thing in books old and new - I'm just looking at a 1942 copy of Approach to Music, which as well as informing me that it was composed using Aldine Bembo and printed by Morrison & Gibb, also features the Book Production War Economy Standard mark: "The typography and binding of this book conform to the authorised economy standards".
As it turns out Alan P is also something of a printing history buff, and he has subsequently sent me a copy of some fantastic frontispieces from Stanley Morison's Four Centuries of Fine Printing. A joy to behold.
I have spotted some present-day magazines that details things like the typefaces and the software used in production, and the rush to highlight environmental credentials means it's quite commonplace to see FSC logos appearing in a larger size than those of the publisher itself. However, such details are rare in other printed products.
On the basis that if you don't ask you don't get, here's an idea: why not request permission to put an imprint on the next job you'd be proud to put your name to?
