Mail Factory

Reviewed by NCMUG member Maria and Gabi Arguello

From the very first impression, Mail Factory struck me as a very, very cool program. Once I began working with it, I realized that the old adage of "Don't judge a book by its cover" did not apply to this instance, because my first impression was right on. The program is very, very good. I did not have to read a manual to get started right away. I summoned my granddaughter, Gabi, nine, to do the creative part with the design of the labels and envelopes. In less than five minutes, she was designing and enjoying her work. It's that easy, elegant and a very powerful application.

Mail Factory is a bargain for all it does. It is a program to design and print envelopes, shipping labels, and address labels on your Macintosh. You can do single or batch printing fast. It comes with many ready-made designs and with more than 500 clipart images You may also insert your own graphics and custom images such as your own company logo. There is a built-in iPhoto browser that allows you to preview and select photos from your iPhoto library. You may apply more than 50 masks to images, control transparency, tint images with colors, rotate, and crop them.

Some of the special features allow printing USPS, POSTNET, and Royal Mail barcodes on labels and envelopes; FIM-A-Code (Facing Identification Mark) can be printed on envelopes with US addresses; there are over 100 handling label signs to use on envelopes and for handling packages; it also correctly formats addresses for more than 50 countries according to postal standards and applies the barcode.
The Inspector helps to format the text, address fields, and choose a preferred address. Mail Factory allows you to select your contacts from Apple's Address Book, Entourage, Eudora, Now Contact, vCard data source, Text File, MS Excel, and FileMaker Pro. This is a very elegant feature, which integrates your address book - whichever address book you happen to use.

Printing labels could't be easier. Mail Factory supports hundreds of label templates from Avery, Sigel, APLI, A-One, DYMO, Xerox, MACO, Decadry, Pimaco, and others. It is also compatible with a DYMO printer. If you want professional, personalized labels and envelopes either for your company or for your personal use Mail Factory is the application for you.

Clipart is usually a disappointment to me and this batch was no exception; but with Mail Factory you can use your own graphics and photos from iPhoto, so your creativity is the only limit.

Product: Mail Factory
Company: Belight Software
http://www.belightsoft.com
Price: $38.95 for a CD; $29.95 for download
Experience Level: None
Minimum Requirements: Mac OS X 1.2 or later