Hi! Today I received a package with many recent cards by theory11 and to my surprise... these are definitely not USPCC-printed. They don't have the signature feel. They smell quite weird too. In some tuck boxes and product pages there are no references to where they were printed. Except in the JAWS deck, it says on the bottom of the tuck that they are printed in China. When did theory11 switch providers? Which company is printing the most recent decks? The cards have a WJPC feel to them, is that it?
Until very recently only decks with special foils were printed in companies other than USPCC, why change it now? Is it to keep cost down? Just curious because it feels like a weird decision for a company that has prided itself on being US-made for so long.
Definitely a valid question and want to help clarify some info here!
Our printing partners can vary depending on press schedule availability—for example, sometimes a partner like USPC may be too backlogged—or based on the specific printing specs required for a project. Because of this, it’s not always consistent for a single deck over its entire production run.
Our decks often utilize multiple print partners for various components - our tucks are mostly made in Minnesota (and some Ohio too, more recently), sticker seals in Colorado, etc. A big focus (and one of the great successes) of us as a company is pioneering mainstream growth of the playing card category, in stores across the USA and worldwide, and that's required us to step up our production game at the same time, to make sure that we don't run out of certain decks or go out of stock for weeks on end.
That said, we have extremely (!) high standards for every deck we produce, no matter the partner. Our specifications ensure that every deck fans, faros, and spreads perfectly, with uniform thickness and handling. We work with a select list of trusted printing partners who meet (and often exceed) our rigorous requirements. We usually don't advertise those partners to protect the proprietary nature of our printing specs.
Hopefully this clears up some confusion!
