We like to complicate the process.

We’re a tangible goods company that designs and creates physical objects you can touch, feel, see, and hear. We do our very best to complicate things. We make books. We make records. We create stuff to make our hearts sing — and hopefully yours too.

Serial entrepreneurs Chris Ryan, owner of Once Films and the founder of STL.org, and Jim Harper, owner of Harper’s Bizarre, as well as PlaidCoffeeRoasters.com, use all of their entities to work together to bring the best possible work to the world. We like to complicate the process.

“The History of St. Louis’s Oldest Publisher.”

It started in 1884

Chris Ryan and Jim Harper’s Great, Great, Great, Grandfather’s started Fine Print small Press when their weekly, multi-lingual newspaper started selling like salted meats. After a night of a combination of whiskey and some kind of liquid-bearing oil, they decreed their business official and inked it in blood.

The Rag

Fine Print Small Press highlighted everything from new magnification and camera equipment, curious local products, people they didn’t like, music, and physical altercations and activities.

a letter

A letter to crimeny harper, was a request to buy something mentioned in the paper, and the company’s first commerce was created. New York liquor magnate benjamin Frehley wanted to buy the “violence boot,” which was written up in the footwear section.

Over a century later, Fine Print Small Press is delivering new publications from Tom Huck: The Devil is in the Details, Carlos Hernandez, Austin Printmaker, and vinyl records from the Three Merry Widows and more. Check back for a more detailed history soon.