Who works with postcards - which paper trimmer/cutter do you use?

[janewhites]

I have 300 gsm kraft paper/card which I need to cut (making a project for a local charity). My budget for this is about $200 (but I can stretch it a bit if it'd be an extremely durable unit). Looking for a time-saver, since I'm pretty good with scissors but this is time-consuming. I also have an old Friskar cutter that was used for fabrics in the past, but unfortunately it doesn't work too  well. Do you have any recommendations?

[janewhites]

I have 300 gsm kraft paper/card which I need to cut (making a project for a local charity). My budget for this is about $200 (but I can stretch it a bit if it'd be an extremely durable unit). Looking for a time-saver, since I'm pretty good with scissors but this is time-consuming. I also have an old Friskar cutter that was used for fabrics in the past, but unfortunately it doesn't work too  well. Do you have any recommendations?

Ladies, a piece of advice? I've been searching for a while and even found out some decent reviews, but still would like to hear from those who have some experience with these.

[Fairy Cardmaker]

I have owned many paper trimmers in the past. The one I have now I love. It's a Dahle - marketed to the photography market for trimming prints. I have the Dahle 507. The cutting bed is over 12 inches long but only 6.5 inches wide. My reasoning for this was that I work with 12 x 12 paper. So, if I can get to 6 inches, then any cuts wider than that I can just work backwards. (Example, if I need to cut a 12 inch width to 8 inches, I just need to cut off 4 inches.) It will not cut very thick materials (e.g. heavy chipboard. Kleenex box or cereal box weight is okay.) I use it to cut my card bases just fine, though, and they are 297 GSM.

There are 2 complaints out there about the Dahle and I fixed both of them. I researched before I bought. (It was about $200.)

• The measurement markings wear off. I had this issue with a past Xacto wood-base guillotine trimmer too. The markings are painted on, not grooves. To fix this, I taped a piece of clear acetate over my trimmer bed, so my papers are never rubbing against the measurement markings.
• You can't measure anything under 1 inch. This is why I keep a mini guillotine trimmer around still. However, I saw someone do this and I did it too. It's not perfect (i.e. not super accurate) but it's not bad. What you do is draw out a 1/4 inch grid on a 1.5 x 12 inch paper. Adhere that to the plastic bed on the other side of the blade where your off cuts fall. That will give you a way to cut when measuring from the opposite side of the trimmer bed.

My Dahle is a rotary blade on a rail. Similar trimmers to this on the market in the paper craft industry are the CutterPillar Pro and the Fiskars one with a single rail or double rail. I looked up a Dahle distributor in Canada and purchased through them.

Other than this slide trimmer, I stand by guillotine trimmers. Guillotines are work horses. I've had a couple from Xacto I got at staples. If I were to buy one today, I would deeply investigate the new wood base one from We R Memory Keepers.

Good luck with your search! Let us know what you go with!