Good business

a friend of mine used Delano services and was happy with the results. Just to put it in perspective it was his first game so he had no grounds for comparison.

I don't know anything about Retmeyer, do you have a link to them?

I contacted Delano, Rehtmeyer, GPI and six other manufacturers for manufacturing quotations. The three above all did nice jobs on getting back to me with proposals. In the end, the factors that seemed to help me decide who to go with were:

1) Is the printing done in the US or abroad? (Unfortunately) you'll have to expect to pay 50% to 100% more for work done in the US. The cost of shipping from Asia to the US was far cheaper than the cost premium of US production (at least in my case)

2) Does the manufacturer have the means to produce all the components of your game or subcontract them? If not, you'll have to work with multiple vendors and have parts assembled somewhere (likely the main printer).

3) Does the manufacturer also provide fulfillment services? If not, you'll need to work with a second company to warehouse and process orders unless you have the space, capability, and patience to do it yourself.

4) Does the manufacturer also provide sales representation services? Some of the game manufacturers also sell games to distributors and retailers directly, and may be able to help you get your game into the hands of these folks. If you have no contacts or knowledge of the industry, you'll probably want help with this too.

I found that representatives from all of the companies that submitted bids were friendly and eager to work with me (as one would hope), so this did not end up being much of a differentiator in my case. Also, I didn't think there would be much difference in the quality of the final product regardless of who I selected, so that wasn't much of a factor either.

Bill