Color Driving Paper Trends

"Before, the standard was a 20-lb. sheet, but now with color and heavy saturation, some extra weight is needed," explains Phelan. "Sometimes toner overpowers a 20-lb. sheet and there isn't enough opacity, so now 24-lb. to 32-lb. sheets are much more common."

Also driving this increase is the ability of today's copiers and production color printers to run a wider range of substrates. According to Laura Shore, Mohawk Paper Mills' vice president of marketing communications, earlier-generation copiers had a pretty narrow range of basis weights.