Somehow I do not think this thread will be as popular as my ask a Starbucks barista one but a figured why not? I plan to make an ask me thread for all my professions.
I’ve been around newspapers a bit, hung out in the press room to check early copies, that sort of thing, but I don’t recognize the job title. What does a feeder do?
Web or sheet press? Litho? Flexo? Gravure? We need details, man!
Scarlett, former litho stripper
Do you have to spell as part of your job?
Ha! Just kidding. My question is, Do you just stick bits of paper in a press? And that’s a paid job?
The feeder is responsible for “throwing paper” (stacking it in a nice little stack) and feeding it into the press. I worked on a sheet fed which means each piece of paper goes in by itself as opposed to a web which is what you probably saw during the news paper days, where a huge roll of paper is fed into the press. Feeding basically makes sure the paper goes in straight and is aligned and not “bouncing”. Depending on how many people work on the press (2-3 though 1 can work…) a feeder sometimes also has to act as a “2nd pressmen” making sure the fit is good (both sides line up) filling up the ink. And having the pressmen watch you change the blankets when you accidentally let a double go through the press. 
Offset sheetfed litho. I worked on a 6 color 40" kormori with a coater and a 6 color 26" kormori with a coater.
My job was to make sure bits of paper don’t get into the press 
. To put is simple i watch sheets of paper go in the press. Making sure they go in straight and the press doesn’t jam. While doing this i must throw paper (flipping it over and stacking it up into nice little stacks so we can print the back.)
Do you like the smell of ink? I aways did. What type of products are you doing, general commercial printing or anything specific? I worked for a sheetfed printer as a shipper, ink mixer, feeder and coffee maker. We did a lot of book covers. Then I moved on to a web printer, catalogs and direct mail. Now I am out of printing, but thinking of going back. Do you enjoy your work enviroment? I always did. A good pressman or foreman can really make you feel part of a team and doing a good job. We had some fun times. Of course a have worked for a few others also.
Bob Z
Meh ink doenst bother me but coating and MRC warm up my heart we did whatever. we had a few jobs we did quarterly or yearly like Sutter jobs.I loved working there nothing beats palletjack races. It was a family because we were such a small shop. 12 hour days were actually fun.
Have you seen the Dirty Jobs episode where Mike is a printing press operator? It sounds a like the same job. It looked easy enough but he only got about 80% (IIRC) of the papers straight.
How’s your hearing?
Oh man, I hated feeding the Komori. I’m a small guy and not very muscular, so heaving those lifts of massive paper into the press was one hell of a workout. Fortunately they didn’t ask me to do it very often; most of the time I just inked and cleaned the press during changeovers. Except the one time some paper disintegrated in the rollers and we had to stay 'til 8pm trying to clean the damn thing out. Cranking a 4-colour Komori over by hand is amazingly difficult. Because you can’t do it buy hand when there’s paper bits and crumpled sheets all gummed up in the rollers. I had to jump on the crank to get it to move so much as an inch.
Good times. Or not. 
I was glad to go back to a simple AB Dick after that.
I’m not a printer anymore though. I had to stop because the constant handling of paper was leeching the oils from my fingers and causing them to dry up and crack. That sucked.
Anyway, that’s my pointless reminiscence for this thread.