Every so often I like to throw the spotlight on a manufacturer that has proven to be reliable and produce great office products. As an online office equipment dealer, we at ABC Office truly appreciate what it is like to work with a reliable manufacturer. This not only helps us, but also helps our customers. Today I would like to introduce you to Formax, one of our most reliable manufacturers.

Formax, a division of Bescorp Inc, is a leading manufacturer of office products. They are well known for their pressure sealers, folder inserters, paper shredders, folding machines and much more. One remarkable thing about Formax is that many of their products are manufactured in the USA. Their line of products are considered to be reliable and have a great track record with our customers.

Formax was originally founded in 1987 and has been in business for over 24 years. They originally specialized in direct sales and service of paper processing equipment around the New England Area.

Formax is currently based out of Dover, New Hampshire and have a manufacturing facility plant in Turlock, California. The actual “Formax” name was established in 1993 right around the time they began to offer industrial bursters, decollators and mergers.

In 1996, thanks to a great reputation and an established network of dealers, Formax introduced one of their most popular brands, AutoSeal. AutoSeal pressure sealers utilize Formaxes patented technology that dramatically simplified pressure-sealing operations. Models today include desktop machines all the way up to industrial pressure sealing machines.

In 2002 Formax began manufacturing high-end paper folding machines and in 2003 Formax acquired a main vendor in FTI (Formax Technologies Incorporated), formerly known as the FHE Division of Tab Products in Turlock, CA.

At ABC Office we offer a huge selection of products from Formax. These products include:

• AutoSeal Pressure Sealers
• Booklet Makers
• Bursters
• Document Signers
• Folder Inserters & Envelope Stuffing Machines
• Letter Openers
• Mail Tabbers
• Paper Folding Machines
• Paper Joggers
• Paper Shredders

We enjoy working with Formax, love selling their products and expect to have many more years of success selling Formax office machines to customers around the world. You can find our entire line of Formax products here.

Because we are an authorized Formax dealer, we are also able to provide servicing, repairs and provide parts for all Formax products. To request repairs and service on your Formax machine, you can contact our Service Department by calling 1-800-658-8788 x129 or by filling out this form.

Are you tired of trying to pry open envelopes with a pen or cutting them open with a knife or scissors? Try increasing your envelope opening speed with an automatic letter opener. One affordable model you may want to consider using is the Martin Yale 1632 electric envelope opener. This is my review.

Martin Yale currently manufactures a wide range of office equipment and machines. This includes paper folding machines, paper cutters, envelope openers and much more. Martin Yale has been around for decades and is known for their affordable office products.

The Martin Yale 1632 is an electric envelope opener. That means rather than manually opening letters, an electric motor is used to pull in envelopes and open them. This description may seem a little simplistic, but it really is that easy. I will go into more detail on exactly how this happens.

The 1632 has a fed tray where you can place a 1 ¾” stack of envelopes. A rubber belt, driven by an electric motor, pulls in one letter at a time and slits them open. This is done without damaging the contents of the envelope. The opened envelope then comes out the other side into a catch tray. The entire process takes a split second.

While the motor on the Model 1632 operates at a speed of up to 7,000 envelopes per hour, I would not recommend using this machine continually to open that many envelopes. This is because the Model 1632 is designed for light to medium-volume letter opening and is ideal for small to mid-size businesses.

It only weighs in at 11 pounds, so it can easily be used on most desks and tables and can be used in most mailrooms. It is also light enough to move from one location to another. A built in catch tray folds into the machine for added portability.

Having handled this letter opener myself, I have to caution that it is not designed for high-volume use. Customers who buy this for low to medium-volume use are almost always happy with it and I can say over the years that it has a  great track record.

Overall the Model 1632 is a good little electric letter opener. It features the quality that Martin Yale is known for, and if properly cared for, should easily hold up for years.

You can find the Martin Yale 1632 electric envelope opener here and our entire selection of letter opening machines here.

Do you have stacks of letters that are piling up? Are you getting tired of manually opening letters by using a knife or handheld letter opener? You probably need to upgrade to an electric letter opener. So what should you look for in an automatic letter-opening machine? Obviously your budget will play a big roll, but you certainly want to get the best machine for your dollar.

Electric letter openers come in a variety of sizes, specifications and prices. Initially this may be a little overwhelming, but there are a few questions you can ask yourself that should help weed out the field and move the candidate list down to a few models.

How many envelopes are you opening per day?

• You may have noticed that automatic letter openers tout a wide variety of “envelopes per hour” in their specifications. While basing a purchase off of the motor’s speed may be a good starting point, this doesn’t necessarily mean the machine can handle a large volume of envelopes. You will also want to find out the machine’s duty cycle. The duty cycle is the maximum number of envelopes the machine can handle in a month’s period of time.

How much desk space do you need?

• Electric letter openers vary greatly in size, with some compact enough to be used on a desk, where others may need an entire work area of their own. Be sure to look at the machine’s dimensions and then determine exactly how large the machine will be in your office.

How big and how thick are the envelopes you are opening?

• As with any office machine, letter openers have maximum and minimum specifications. Be sure the letter opener you get can handle the largest and the smallest envelopes you receive. One of the most important specifications to look at is the maximum thickness. Most letter openers handle at a 3/16″ thick envelope, but some handle more and others less.

Do you have a preference between chadless & non-chadless?

• Some electric letter openers simply slit open an envelope, where others cut the entire end off. This is a matter of preference in most situations. Envelope openers that cut the entire end of an envelope off create more of a mess, but some people think contents are easier to remove when an envelope is opened this way. Other people prefer the mess-free chadless openers that simply slit the envelope open. Either way, the contents of the envelope will not be damaged (per design).

What is your budget?

• Ultimately your budget will be the final decision. Finding the right machine to fit your budget can often be the biggest challenge. Our friendly office equipment specialists can help answer some of your most critical questions, especially when it comes to budgets. Our experts will not try to steer you towards the most expensive machine, rather the best fit for your needs. You can reach our experts by calling 1-800-658-788.

Hopefully this guide has helped answer some of your questions. You can find our entire selection of automatic electric letter openers here.

We all get letters on a daily basis. Many of us use a knife or a metal letter opener to slice open the mail. This is hands-down better than opening a letter by ripping it open. There is another option for opening letters at home.

This other option is the electric letter opener. These convenient little machines make letter opening fast and sometimes fun. One model you may want to consider using is the Martin Yale 1624 hand-held electric letter opener. This is my review.

Martin Yale makes a wide variety of high-end letter opening machines. Most of these are designed for commercial, high-volume use. If you’re only concerned about opening letters at home, the 1624 is probably what you need.

The Martin Yale 1624 is a compact electric letter opener designed to fit in the palm of your hand. It is designed for opening a few pieces of mail, which it does well, but not for the high-volume environment you find in an office.

The 1624 is a lightweight letter opener, weighing in at only 4.6 oz. It measures in at 5 1/4″ x 2 3/8″ x 1 3/4″. It runs on four AA batteries, which can be a pro or a con depending on your preference. Because it runs on batteries, it can be used just about anywhere. It is so compact that it can be placed in a desk drawer or a briefcase without any problem.

Using the 1624 is pretty easy. Simply take the 1624 letter opener in one hand and your envelope in the other. Place the edge you want to open into the letter opener, following the arrow printed on the machine. Once inserted, the 1624 will automatically turn on and open the letter. The opened letter will come out the other side.

I would have to say that the biggest pro of this letter opener is how compact and portable it is. The biggest con would have to be that it isn’t designed for high-volume use.

Overall I think the Martin Yale 1624 is perfect for most home-use and small-office applications. It is a nice looking machine, affordable and gets the job done quickly.

You can find the Martin Yale 1624 hand-held electric letter opener here. You can find our entire selection of electric letter openers here.

Do you work in a mailroom or a business that has to open hundreds to thousands of letters a day? If so, you are in serious need of a high-quality letter opener. We have several to choose from. One model you may want to consider is the Staplex MA-500 Accuslitter letter opener. This is my review.

Staplex is well known for making staplers (as if the name didn’t give it away). I’m not talking about a cheap Swingline. I’m talking about heavy-duty electric staplers. Staplex also makes a couple of industrial letter openers. This includes the Staplex MA-500 Accuslitter.

The MA-500 isn’t a small letter opener you use to open a few dozen letters here and there. It is a commercial-quality machine designed to open 250 envelopes a minute up to 3/16″ thick. The electric-powered motor itself runs at a speed of 15,000 letters a minute. While not the fastest machine out there, it will easily keep up with most mailrooms.

This letter opener is designed to slit open envelopes rather than cut them open. This is done in an effort to not only keep things clean, but also to help protect the contents of the envelope. It’s a rather efficient system. The slit is placed in such a way that mail won’t accidentally fall out.

Because there is less cutting involved, the MA-500 Accuslitter is actually pretty quiet. While mailrooms aren’t the quietest places in the office, at lest the MA-500 won’t be contributing to the noise level.

At only 20 pounds, the Staplex MA-500 can be used on just about any workbench, table or desk. This also makes it very portable. There are really only two parts to the MA-500. You have the motorized portion of the machine and the receiving tray where the open mail is held. Many letter openers don’t come with a receiving tray.

Here are a few additional features you’ll find in the Staplex MA-500 Accuslitter:

• AccuLloy blade
• Impact resistant housing
• 8 foot (2.4 m) grounded power supply cord
• Thermal overload protection
• Built-in resettable circuit breaker

The build quality on the MA-500 is great, which is the case with Staplex staplers as well. I would personally recommend this machine for use in most medium-volume mailrooms.

You can find the Staplex MA-500 Accuslitter electric letter opener here. You can find our entire selection of letter opening machines here. Do you still have questions? Feel free to call one of our experts at 1-800-658-8788.

I had a customer ask me recently if electric letter openers sometimes damage the mail they are opening. I can understand the concern. Anytime blades and knives are involved, you would think damage could potentially occur. So, can an automatic electric letter opener damage mail?

The answer to this is yes and no, depending on the letter-opening machine being used. There are two very distinct technologies used. Here is what you will find when looking for a letter opener.

Traditional Letter Opener – Traditional electric letter openers literally cut off the edge of an envelope. This is usually about a 1/8-inch strip. Cutting off this edge allows access to the contents inside. Because cutting is involved, if mail contents are too close to the edge, the potential does exist of the mail being cut as well. The chances of this happening are very slim.

Envelope Slitter / Opener – Envelope slitters use a slightly different approach to opening mail. They slit the outside of the envelope, near the edge, allowing access to the contents inside. The blade is designed to slit the envelope deep enough to open the envelope, but not so deep that it cuts the contents inside. This newer technology is safer for mail and creates very little mess.

The chances of mail being damaged by a letter opener are pretty slim. We have sold many of these machines over the years and I have yet to hear from a customer complaining about their mail being damaged.

We currently offer a great selection of high-speed automatic letter openers that utilize both technologies. The machine you use in your mailroom will depend entirely on how many pieces of mail and letters you will be opening per day.

You can find our entire selection of automatic electric letter openers here.

Opening letters and envelopes can be messy and a hassle. One machine that can really speed things up is an automatic letter opener. If you are in the process of looking for one, a model you should seriously consider is the Formax FD 450 automatic electric envelope opener. This is my review.

To begin with, Formax has been making high-end office equipment for years. They are best known for their paper folder inserters, but they also make a wide range of joggers, bursters, paper shredders and letter openers. The build quality with Formax is excellent. Most Formax products are made in the U.S.A. and the FD 450 is one of them.

The Formax FD 450 is designed for high speed and high volume letter opening. This is all done automatically. You place the letters in the hopper on one end, the FD 450 opens them and they come out the other end opened up. The concept is simple, but there are subtle differences between letter opening machines that you will want to be aware of.

To begin with, the Formax FD 450 uses a slitter to open up mail. This means there are no letter ends cut off or waste paper strips lying around. The FD 450 cuts the mail open, without damaging the contents. The process is quick and best of all it’s very clean. Many other competitors cut off the top of the envelope, leaving waste paper strips behind, which is messy and can potentially damage contents.

The FD 450 is also pretty fast. It operates at a speed of up to 300 envelopes per minute. This is blazing fast. Not only is it fast at opening envelopes, it can open various mixed sizes of envelopes without jamming or causing issues. Envelope sizes can range from 3.5 x 11-inches up to 5.5 x 15.6-inches. This is a nice range and should cover most envelopes sizes used today.

The machine itself only weighs 20 pounds, so it can be used on pretty much any table, workbench or desk. Moving the letter opener should also be fairly easy to do. Overall setup and use is extremely easy and does not require any special training.

You can get the Formax FD 450 with the optional 402 series paper jogger. This will jog envelopes as they leave the machine and keep everything neat and organized.

I consider the Formax FD 450 to be once of the highest quality automatic letter openers available on the market. You will find the FD 450 in mailrooms, schools, churches and businesses. The “American-Made” quality is some of the best I have seen.

You can find the Formax FD 450 automatic letter opener here. You can find our entire selection of automatic letter openers here.

Electric letter openers are a critical and essential part to any mailroom. They can be a lifesaver or a nightmare, depending on the quality and reliability of the model being used. They key word there is “model being used.” Are you using the right model?

One of the biggest customer service issues I see, regarding letter openers, is customers using an electric letter opener for a job that is much bigger than the letter opener was designed to handle. It isn’t that the poor letter opener is malfunctioning, but rather it is being misused.

You won’t see a bicycle being used in NASCAR. Although a bike gets you from point A to point B, it won’t win any races. OK. Bad analogy on my part, but hopefully you get the point. Here are a few things to look for in an electric letter opener prior to making a purchase:

Mess – Many letter openers are now available in a chadless format. This means there isn’t any messy clippings laying around after a job.

Speed – Check out the letter openers speed. Make sure it will handle what you need to open now and in the future.

Thickness – Make sure your letter opener can handle your thickest letter. You don’t want any jams!

Tray – Do you need an exit tray? Some letter openers come with an exit tray for the opened mail.

You can find ABC Office’s entire selection of electric letter openers here. Also, we have some well-trained experts here who know a lot about the various models we carry, so feel free to call them and ask questions at 1-800-658-8788. Enjoy!

You don’t often say, “What genius invented this?” when referring to a letter opener. That is exactly what I say, however, when presented with the task of opening hundreds or even thousands of letters at once. And no, I’m not referring to this kind of letter opener:

I’m talking about the Porche of letter openers. The machines that are fully mechanized and ready to open hundreds of letters in seconds. They range from hand-held electric letter openers to assembly-line style letter openers capable of handling bag loads of letters.

This is an example of a hand-held letter opener. It can be easily held in one hand, is completely portable and can be stored in a cupboard or desk drawer at the office.

And this is an example of an industrial-strength letter opener. It is designed for high-volume industrial use. This is something you would see in a large business mail room. Although big, it is still relatively easy to set up and use.

These letter openers are readily available at ABC Office. Take a look at this selection of letter openers.

Letter openers vary from speed, size and quality, but any of these models certainly beat using a pair of scissors, a knife or even your bare hands. Come and take a look. You’ll probably find something you like.