The sounds of laughter and screams greeted me when I arrived at the shop. Normally when you hear this combination of sounds it can mean only one thing; they were bored but have found something to amuse themselves. Just like the ordeal with the Tabbies Foamclip Self-Adhesive Paper Fasteners, they were once again using and abusing the office supplies;. this time they were playing a rather creative game to see who could fasten the most binder clips to their body before they called it quits. Now, if this were bad enough they were upping the stakes each time - moving to more sensitive spots on their body. By time I arrived they’d already done arms, legs, fingers, toes, thighs and lips. Actually there were two games going on; one to see how many you could clip on a certain part of a body and one to see how long you could keep one of them clipped to a “sensitive” area [translation: nipples or other unmentionable parts]. Shaking my head and leaving them to their own devices I headed to my office, put on a pot of tea and slowly closed the door. The last thing you want to do with these people is make any sudden movements - if you do, you’ll get sucked into playing their little games and being in the receiving end of a binder clip isn’t exactly what I’d call fun ... well, at least not at work.

ACCO Binder Clips 1/4 inch capacity

We used to call these bulldog clamps not binder clips and most of the time when I am hunting for them, that’s what I call them. They are a great alternative to paper clips when you are working with stacks of paper or are dealing with a large volume of paper. There are a lot of ways that these can be used; on the tops to hold sheets in place [and you can use these to hang up papers] or along the sides. You can use them along the sides if you don’t want something permanently bound or if you are proofing something that needs to be in a specific order. These rarely leave an impression on things that they are used on but it does happen. If you are using this on larger stacks of paper you could see some indentations from the bottom of the clip; to avoid this use a larger clip or break the stacks into smaller groupings. Another option is to make a slip over piece from card stock, cut it out a little larger than the size of the clip, fold it and slip it over the area where the clip will be used.

The number of sheets that this will safely bind or hold together depends on the thickness or bond of the paper; for loose leaf or copy paper you can fit anywhere from 50 to 75 sheets without and problems or denting and for thicker sheets, 30 - 40. If you try to clip too many pages together you can get impressions in the pages, something that you will want to avoid if you are using the paper in a printer. Likewise, if you are going to use these to hang schedules, price lists or print outs, avoid using too many pages or they could slip out of the clip and make a real mess. One of the coolest things about these clips is that you can flip the metal prongs over so they don’t stick out or leave them ‘as is’ so you can hang them up. These can be used for a lot of different things around the office or in your home and they are truly a great alternative to paper clips!

Alternative uses

This is a must have for crafters; you can hold things together while glue is setting up or if you need to have constant pressure on something that you are repairing. I use these around the shop for power cords too; it’s important that you don’t attach this to the power cord but rather slip it inside the body of the clip. This keeps cords out of the way but still allows you to use the item. The two metal prongs on the clip let you hang it from a nail or larger tack, this helps from tripping over longer cords but again, lets you use it or move it to another spot. This is also nice to have for recipe cards in the kitchen, you can clip together the ones that you use most often and have them hanging from one of the prongs so you can read them easily when baking or cooking but they are out of the way.

Price

Wal-Mart has the best price on the smaller twelve count boxes; they carry them for about $1.35 which isn’t bad. If you need larger quantities you can hit places like Office Depot or Staples and they do give you a price break for larger boxes. They make these in several different sizes so if you need to temporarily bind smaller or large stacks, they do have other binder clips for your needs. To me these are more than worth it because there are so many things that you can do with them.

The Bottom Line

Whether you call them bulldogs or binder clamps, these are something that can help keep things a little more organized around your office. They are made of metal, can be used over and over and rarely ever break. These aren’t something that smaller kids should be allowed to play with or have access to, the pressure between the clamp is pretty strong and could easily pinch skin to the point where a blood blister could result. So far I’ve only had a few of these break and that was usually after I tried to clamp too many pages together or put too much pressure on one of the prong and they snapped out of the housing. If you have ever used one of these you know exactly how well they are formed and the amount of pressure that you need to break one of these - it’s not something that happens often. For more information about other ACCO products, visit their official website at www.accobrands.com


As always, thanks for the read!

~^V^~ Freak ~^V^~

© 2005 Freak369


Other office essentials ...

Bates Vinyl Coated Paper Clips
Manco EZ Tear Carton Tape
Post-It 4 Color Detachable Dispenser
Rubbermaid Unbreakable Magnetic Wall File
Elmer’s Adhesive Tack Putty
Universal “Past Due” Pre-Inked Stamp
Fellowes P50CM Confetti Cut Shredder





Recommended: Yes