The Fellowes Venus Laminator is one of the premium office laminators that laminate hot or cold and a variety of thickness laminating pouches for at home or office convenience.
Ease of Use, Performance: 24/25
Look & Feel: 23/25
Features 25/25
How much I enjoy 23/25
Total: 95/100
Laminators have come a long way in such a short time; my wife’s daycare has this behemoth laminator that takes rolls of plastic to laminate their projects. This may be the perfect laminator for large objects such as posters but it is such a pain to use and change the rolls of plastic. A day care is the perfect example of a work situation that requires a laminator that works well and is not only easy to use but safe.
They are occasionally forgetting it and leaving the heater on which is not exactly a safe situation but I won’t even get into trying to replace the roll of laminating plastic. To laminate several objects like photos and letter sized papers they want to use for games or hang up they have to sit and place each item, hold them in place as it starts to go into the machine and wait for it to come out the other side.
Yes, they can laminate poster sized objects but they do that so very rarely, mostly they laminate letter sized posters and smaller stuff for games and activities so they last longer than a day or two. Using a laminator should be easy and the Fellowes people know how to construct not only safe and reliable products but easy to operate ones.
The Fellowes Venus Laminator is a great laminator and so very easy to use as well as having several safety features like an automatic lock so you cannot open the cover when it is hot. No getting near the heating rollers or any of the insides until it cools off so you can’t burn yourself, even when it is off and unplugged.
This perplexed me when I first opened the box and tried to peer inside at the inner workings of the good looking laminator, I just wanted to check out the insides when I first received it. Then I read some of the accompanying pamphlets and saw a screw that holds the unit closed in shipping and thought my problems were solved. I still could not open the cover and decided to read the manual and find out if there was something else holding it closed as it seemed to be held shut in one spot.
If all else fails I dig into the manual and read the operating instructions because the thing would not open, it was latched shut and was not coming open at all. In order to open it you have to plug it in and run it through a maintenance cycle to let the machine cool down to ensure it is safe and then the electronic latch will open and allow access to the rollers and heaters inside. This makes sure no one will get hurt even fooling around with it and makes for an extremely safe product.
The Venus Laminator comes with the laminator itself, a power cord, the manual and a starter kit that has a couple of laminating sheets in it. The starter kit is merely a few pouches to get you started as well as a few other things but you can purchase more pouches through Fellowes or your local office supply store like Office Depot or Office Max. Both stores carry their own brand of laminating pouches in a few different sizes that work perfectly with the Fellowes brand laminator.
I also received a package of laminating pouches for the Venus Laminator and tried them out doing a few projects as well as some laminating pouches from Office Depot. I laminated some pictures and business cards with the Venus and it works very well and on the first pass. When laminating it is important to set the thickness correctly as well as waiting for it to heat up for the best lamination possible.
One thing I have found about using some laminators and not only using the correct thickness as well as heating times but the machine itself needs to work well. I have seen in the past some laminators do not get the job done the first time and you may have to run the pouch through a second time in order to correctly laminate your project. I have seen on even very expensive laminators that you may need to put them through a second time but with the Fellowes I had to only do the posters and business cards once. I figured out the 5 mil thickness of the business card pouches from the Office Depot website and had no problem running them through and having them laminate correctly on one pass. I also had my wife, who is not exactly machine friendly, use the laminator and found it not only easy to use but convenient to have at home instead of work.
The Fellowes Venus Laminator Model 125 will cold and hot laminate 3 to 10 mil thick pouches using four rollers with a maximum width of 12.5 inches. The laminator uses regular 120 volt 60 hz plug in and has plenty of safety features like auto shut off after 60 minutes of non use. This and the automatic latch that keeps it closed as long as it is warm ensures proper safety for office use as well as home.
The buttons for the laminator may be a bit confusing at first so keeping the manual handy at the machine is a must. To turn on the laminator you use the switch by the rear power connection. Unless you do not use it often you can let it go into standby mode and it will not use power except for the LED screen and a small circuit, the rollers and heater are shut off in standby.
To use the Venus Laminator you simply push the stand by button which is a triangle inside a circle. The LED will light up and the screen will show a chart with options for hot or cold as well as thickness. You move the highlighted section over the hot or cold and thickness you want to laminate and press the center button to start the process.
It will start the rollers and start to warm up the machine as well as show a bar for progress, a small hand will flash to show you need to wait for the heater to warm before laminating. It will take a couple of minutes and all the literature I read says it will not take more than four minutes to warm up. I found it took less and would often be ready in about two and a half minutes.
In order to access the machine for maintenance like cleaning out a jam if the reverse does not clear it you can press the open button and wait several minutes until the unit cools off. It will start a fan inside the machine to enhance cooling and after a few minutes you can open it to clear the machine. You can also clean it using some wipes that are also sold at office supply stores or through Fellowes. A few wipes are also in the starter kit that is with the Venus Laminator as well as two sizes of cleaning cards. You can also use a piece of cardstock or other stiff paper to clean the rollers as this merely runs through the machine to pick up anything off the rollers.
The reverse feature is nice as the machine does work pretty fast; ask my wife and her first attempt at a lamination. She is used to the very slow laminator at her work and thought she would have time to adjust the picture in the pouch when it went that a way through the machine a bit crooked. It did not jam and did come through all the way but the side rolled over and doubled inside the machine.
It just ruined the picture on that side and she had to reprint it but the machine held up to her “abuse” and worked perfectly. I guess it passed the wife test well and I had no problems using it for some fun pictures as well as business cards and placards for settings on a table at an upcoming craft sale.
The Fellowes Venus Laminator is a very good purchase even though it is a bit expensive, but with the expense also comes the nice stylish design as well as the important safety features. The other models in the office line of Fellowes laminators are the same design just smaller and less expensive. They all look to be made of the same quality materials but I am mainly reviewing the Venus model.
I am very pleased with the safety features as well as the performance of the Fellowes Venus laminator and highly recommend it for office and business use as well as home for the crafter, teacher or home business person. Fellowes continues to show their quality and stylish designs in their products and I continue to like their products.
