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The life and business practices of Pierre II Pautonnier are little known. Grandson of Guillaume Morel, husband of a granddaughter of Christopher Plantin, this printerbookseller failed. But we learn a lot by studying his strategies. We see the deposit conditions of the ‘Grecs du Roi’, the printing conditions of the ‘feuilles classiques’. When Pautonnier obtains the appointment of royal printer, most major Parisian publishers are involved in the Catholic Reformation. However he sells his office to a protestant, Jean Jannon. Pautonnier worked for Barthélemy de Laffemas or Toussaint Du Bray. Perhaps he had more vocation to serve the Palace customers. His attempts to run a shop there show the attractiveness of the place and the difficulties of a printer to raise the necessary capital. Deprived of inheritance, Pautonnier resorted to borrowings and expedients that will lead him to flee Paris in 1611.