Business Cards are still important business tools…even in this digital/wired age.

Despite the steadily growing importance of digital databases, where all your important contact information is just a few keystrokes away, millions upon millions of people still use printed business cards.

If you have a business, they are still de rigeur.

With that in mind, what is the best business card for you and your business?

There are a few basics to keep in mind here.

One, of course, is cost. With today’s low cost desktop printers, you can pretty much launch your home business with a few nicely designed and relatively inexpensive “home made” cards.

Here are 5 tips on how to make your business card work for you:

1) Let’s start with the selection of the right paper.

Card or cover stock for your laser or inkjet printer is available at your nearest office supply store, paper store or from online paper merchants. The choices range from pre-perforated multiple/detachable cards on a single sheet to more higher-end stocks with polished surfaces (coated). The keyword here is perceived value, or what kind of impression your card will make on those who receive it.
The rule here is simple: the thicker the stock, the better the card looks and the greater the “perceived value” on the part of the recipient.

(to be continued)

To use another cliché, “Plan ahead.”

There is an apocryphal story of a newbie newspaper publisher who went out of business after his first issue appeared. The reason for this was his failure, despite the sterling job he’d done on all previous steps, to make sure that the last step in the publishing process was done right. So, after putting together a good inaugural edition of his newspaper, he had all the copies bundled and stacked on the loading dock of his printing plant waiting to be delivered to various retail outlets all over the city and surrounding areas.

The problem was that the delivery team had not been issued instructions about where to deliver them. Not wanting to leave all 50,000 copies just lying there unread on the dock and lacking delivery instructions from his boss (who was incommunicado for some strange reason), the head of the shipping & receiving department decided to have them all shipped to the hotel where the publisher was staying.

The enterprise’s financial backers lost faith in the paper’s publisher after this fiasco and cancelled their investment.

With these two bits of advice in mind, let’s look at a simple 5-step program for getting a print job done right. The key here is something like reverse engineering, and this is done by “stating backwards.”

What this means is that before you do anything, you envision the final product…what it is and how it will be used, and make absolutely sure that the entire design and production process revolves around the successful execution of this last and most crucial step; the step where “the rubber meets the road.”

For the hapless newspaper publisher mentioned above, this last step was distribution.

If you are producing a commercial print order for end use by a business then you need to make sure that it is delivered on time and to the right address or addresses. If it’s a manufacturing plant, let’s say, and the purchasing office is located at a different address, you need to know if the billing/office address…the one with which you are doing business…is the address to which the pored needs to be shipped. In many cases, especially in the case of a corporate office with one or many manufacturing facilities spread out over a wide area, this is not the case. Manufacturing plants need their industrial printing…safety tags, product labels, bills of lading for their transportation department delivered on time so that shipments are not delayed for want of same. Don’t keep them waiting by delivering their printing to the home office instead of to the industrial facility itself.

Thee is also the question of format. Let’s say, for example, that you are selling a prospective or existing print client on advertising/promotional printing. Your first question should be about the last step in distribution; where and how will the printed piece be distributed? Will it be used in a mass mailing?

Then size and weight are crucial factors, since the mailing costs are determined by these two questions.

It must be pointed out that the graphic design department should be involved in this one. If, for example, a client wants to keep postage costs down to a minimum, then the lowest post card rate is desirable. But can the copy fit on so small an area in a way which will allow it to retain its effectiveness, or will doing so lower the ROI of the campaign to the point where the money saved is less than the money lost? If it’s “touch and go” here then maybe the point size of the type and or image size(s)can be reduced so that the post card’s message ‘works” and it can still be mailed at the lowest rate.

Are you printing a book or magazine for someone that is to be displayed / sold in store racks or mailed to customers? If it’s the former, then you should thoroughly investigate the market if you client expects you to take on the role of researcher as well as that of printer. What is the maximum periodical size that the prospective merchant distributor can or will handle, and is there an optimal rack-slot size that the merchant favors and will therefore allow your client’s book or magazine to be given a good spot in the store?

I know that printers or print brokers should be paid to do the actual production and not be held responsible for roles that don’t fall within this area. But reality has a way of setting in, and clients…especially the oldest and best ones…will often want your opinion on and help with a variety of functions that may not, strictly speaking, be described by the job description of “printer.”

Sometimes a little bit of ingenuity will help here. I did a number of print-and-distribute jobs for a local realtor. He ordered 5,000 printed pieces at a time, which he then wanted distributed door-to-door in a large residential area. The problem was that instead of ordering doorknob hangers…a likely choice in this instance… he wanted to use letter-size flyers in order to cut down on printing costs.  He was also rather particular about the way in which the pieces were delivered; they were not to be just dropped at the street end of the homeowner’s driveway (which would have been easiest for my delivery crew) or even dropped on the front door step but instead placed either between the screen door and the main door or tucked under the welcome mat. I can’t say that I blame him. After all, he just wanted to make a good impression on his homeowner/prospects and so I had my “drop” crew follow his instructions.

Our first few times out we took about 30% more time than I had planned- or budgeted for. I was actually losing money on the job. Then an idea occurred to me; an idea that was simple and easy to implement. Why not roll the flyers into cylinders and then rubber band them? In this way the delivery person could easily throw them onto the front porch from a few feet away, thus saving him/her at least ten steps on almost every “drop.” Since the flyer was printed on one side only, and the printed side was protected by the direction of the roll, this was perfectly alright with the client. The result was that delivery became much easier physically for my crew, we saved lots of time/energy which was also transferred into cost savings. This was possible even with the time spent rolling and rubber-banding the flyers!

That’s it for now.

Hope you got something out of this article, and thanks again for visiting blog.kleinprint.com

To illustrate just how important this factor is, think back on the time you wanted to surprise your significant other with a homemade birthday card using a photo taken off the internet. It looked great onscreen, and you still remember the less than enthusiastic expression on his/her face when they saw the photo. At the time, of course you were too stung by their disappointment to ask them just what was wrong with the photo. Was it too dark, too light, just plain faded, just plain blah; too coarse, too grainy too this, too that?

Whether, in fact, the problem was bad lighting, a bad pose, a bad facial expression, or was just taken when you or they were having a bad day, there was one problem underlying all these other possible problems. It was taken off the internet at a very low resolution and then printed offset or digital.

Perhaps the best way to sum it up is by calling on that oft- used acronym coined in the computing world in the nineteen eighties: GIGO-“Garbage In, Garbage Out.”

In other words, Photoshop is an incredible, unbelievably good digital manipulation and enhancement program. Appearances to the contrary, however-and despite the professional pyrotechnics of its most skillful users – it is not designed to create miracles.

The first step in getting a good print job, whether it’s the most delicate graphic or plain old text, is to make sure that output and input  match. The only way to do this is to apply the “two-way street” rule. Start with the first step, which is photo capture, and then go  backwards from the final, or output, step,. The key to making sure that the initla step is done right is sufficient resolution. first step  is/ the resolution.. These two steps, taken as integers in a simple mathematical equation, will give you the right equation for a good print job.  If, to the contrary, one or the other is sub-standard; e.g. if the photo was taken at print-ready resolution but the printing device was low-resolution – or vice versa – it will not work.

What is the last step in the printing process, or what device will be used to print it?

This consideration alone will go a long way towards ensuring a quality reproduction. Pleasing color may be in the eye of the beholder, but the main factor in doing the pleasing is the nature of the equipment that is used.

As far as most internet photos go, the resolution is just too low to produce professional grade offset or digital reproduction. Period. That’s all she wrote. The first step of data capture/information is what we’re dealing with here, and no degree of skill or resourcefulness in any later steps in the production process.

Generally, when you’re choosing the resolution of a Photoshop image or some such 300 dpi is what you want for high quality color reproduction.  There is another factor that comes into play with offset printing, and that is line screen. The rule of thumb for offset-printed reproductions of color photographs or otherwise intricate images in color is that the line screen…the number of rows of halftone dots within a square inch…should be  one half of the resolution of the original image. To stand this metric on its head; the resolution should be twice the line screen used in the printing process. The minimum line screen for printing quality color images of any type on coated paper stock is 150 lpi (lines per inch).

Most 4+ unit offset presses today do not go below 175 lpi, and a line screen of 200 lpi is becoming more and more common as direct-to-plate and advances in printing press design and technology continue to abound.

The graphics and printing industry is very much the handmaiden of photography; and the proliferation of affordable 12+ megapixel digital cameras has made it imperative for the  print industry to revise its criteria for image quality. The research and development departments of major digital paper manufacturers and the makers of digital/semi-digital printing equipment…from Xerox’s Docucolor to the digital/offset hybrid presses that are becoming more and more popular and…have also “raised the bar” regarding  industry-wide standards of print quality.

If affordable color printing is very much the stepchild of computerization and the digital revolution that have taken place in the world of graphics and printing in the last quarter century., then greater expectations re image quality on the part of the general buying public—as well as that of professional print buyers —is another result of this transformation.

Source: Prof. Albert Greco of Fordham University’s extrapolation of U.S. Department of Commerce data

The rise of digital publishing:

Total numbers for both print and digital represent sales of hardbound and paperbound books in the following categories: Adult fiction and non-fiction; Juvenile/young adult fiction and non-fiction, mass market paperbacks fiction and non-fiction.

Future numbers are projections
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/06/05/v-fullstory/2251303/books-books-grows-amidst-challenging.html#ixzz1Ogns6xUc

How you can (almost) make money grow on trees!

Paper selection and paper costs (unless you’re using another substrate) are an important consideration in all print jobs.

The printing business you use to get your printing done customarily sells you the
paper used for your print job at a mark-up.
They probably paid wholesale prices for their paper; the profit on which is as basic a component of ROI as any other in the world of printing.
The good news is that there is a way to cut down on your paper costs, which in
some cases may comprise a considerable portion of the cost of your print job.
How?

Buy the paper yourself!

There are several ways to do this; most commonly by contacting a local paper merchant or by searching online.
One way is to look on EBay or another online store or auction site.
Another good source is your local paper merchant; many if not most of whose customers are print and graphics professionals.
They frequently offer paper at closeout prices; prices which are often sharply marked down from normal wholesale prices or as much as 75% from the retail or list price!
I once purchased about $15,000.00 worth of quality paper for only $2,000.00.
Why?
My local paper store was stuck with an unclaimed order consisting of various sizes, thicknesses and colors.
They were almost all in parent-sheet form; a parent sheet being a larger sheet ranging in size from 17×22″ up to 28″ x 40″ that is run at full size or cut down and run at a smaller press sheet (the sheet that is actually run through the printing press) size on smaller printing presses.
The larger sizes of parent sheet, especially, take up a lot of shelf space; and can cost considerable money and labor to ship back to the warehouse if unpaid for or unclaimed by the customer.

Rather than go through the trouble and expense of restocking this order, which was taking up floor space, the paper company manager agreed to sell the whole lot to me for a few thousand dollars-well below the wholesale cost of almost $15,000.00.

In addition to unclaimed and hard-to-reshelve paper lots, some of the biggest discounts can be had on discontinued paper lines or on unpopular colors from best-selling paper lines.
These offerings are by no means cheaply made or lacking in quality.
For these reasons and for other less obvious ones, it is often deemed to be worth the paper merchant’s while to clear them off the floor ASAP and make room for other products or paper lines.
In fact, it’s quite possible that your printer might be planning to visit that very store later that day in order to snatch up some of this stock for your next print job and sell it to you at a one heck of a mark-up.!
It would be good business on his part because while saving money on his paper costs he can turn around and make you, the customer, happy by keeping his retail price competitive.

You, the customer, can save money on your proint job by supplying the paper yourself.

There are several instances, in fact,  in which your printer might even preferthat you do so.

One such instance is a desire on the printer’s part to avoid adding to his bill with the paper company
If he is paying cash in advance for the paper or increasing the balance owed to his paper supplier while waiting for you, the customer, to pay 10 or 30 days after the job is delivered, he might very well prefer that the customer take care of paying for and providing the paper.
If the paper is expensive, that is all the more reason for him not to object or for him to actually
prefer that the customer provide the paper.
A word of caution here…to ensure a quality print job, your printer needs to inspect the paper that
you provide to make sure that it is “up to snuff.” To avoid any problems in this area, it is best
to buy only from reputable sources and avoid a situation where you end up losing money rather than saving it by buying paper which is defective. Make sure that your online source has a proven track record.
Established paper merchants, since they are “B2B” or business-to-business, are on the whole more reliable than private party vendors in this matter.
Since the former receive much of their paper already boxed and sealed from their warehouse or mill, however, it is possible that even with the best intentions on your paper merchant’s part your purchase may contain defective sheets or merchandise without their (your paper store) knowing about it. Although this happens rarely, it is not unknown. The only solution is to inspect the paper as soon as you buy it. If you are buying envelopes or some other paper stock which comes in an easy-to-open container inspect a sample from various places within the box or paper lot in order to get an idea of the general quality of the contents. Save your receipt, of course, so if informed by your printer that the paper is not behaving correctly while going through the press you can get a refund or exchange from your source.

Also – and this is very important – ask your printer if  by reducing the cut size or finished size of your printed piece you will save a whole lot of money on paper by allowing him to get a much better yield out of the parent sheet used for your job. Sometimes, by reducing the size of the finished piece by as little as a few percentage points you may actually get 15% or more paper for the same price!

More to come on buying paper…

Are you in the printing business?

Then you know that it is changing while we speak!

I started out selling business cards and stationery out of a catalog in 1982. Before I’d ever heard of a “bleed” or “camera-ready” artwork, I was told by the print broker who had just hired me to sell printing on a commission basis to get out there and get that all-important first order.

In the nineteen eighties, Mergenthalers and other typesetting machines were “state of the art,” and strictly the province of professionals. With the introduction of Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop, around 1990, the game changed significantly. They were considerably less costly than then the recently outmoded wave of equipment, and anyone who owned a desktop computer could set up a graphic design and typesetting business in the comfort of his or her own home.
Today these wondrous drawing and photo editing programs are so well known that “to Photoshop” has entered the English (and other languages as well) language as a verb.

Fast forward to the next decade. The volume of digitally-submitted artwork exceeded that of mechanically-created files for the first time in 1993. Other problems arose, as a direct result of this sweeping technological change. Chief among them was the need to “preflight” artwork.
Since artwork was no longer presented in a format as obvious and direct as that of the recently supplanted “mechanical,” When a client or graphic designer had given you artwork in this form, you could plainly and immediately see if it was “up to snuff”
and ready to print. All that was required for this inspection was the keen and natural eye of a trained and experienced observer.
Now one had to open up and inspect all print files on his computer to make sure that they were press-ready and without defect. For all the advantages offered by electronic art, there were yet other problems to deal with.
Were all fonts bundled with the artwork?
Was the disk or diskette (remember them?) file corrupted?
Had all platform- and software-related compatibility factors been considered?

The scope of the changes that have taken place in the printing and graphics industries in the last thirty years is nothing short of incredible.

Can you relate to this?

Have you had similar experiences as a graphic designer, press operator, paper salesperson, estimator, post-press or bindery operator, or just a student and observer of print and graphics technology?

Then please let us know what you think.

This is an ongoing post about the past, present and future of printing…commercial, offset, digital, letterpress, post-press, Photoshop, Illustrator and  everything / anything else that is either directly or indirectly related to printing.

Are you a “newbie” who wants advice about getting something printed?

Please post!

Are you just thinking about the future of printing and/or communication and want to exchange viewpoints with others?

Hope to hear from you soon!

Are you a diehard non-reader by choice and feel that books are…at best…odorous, tree-wasting remnants of a bygone or almost bygone age?

Feel free to rant and rave. Just try to spell something correctly (LOL)!

Are you in the business of printing, publishing, writing, editing, bookselling, or bookstore browsing for fun or profit?

The way we process conventional alphabets and glyphs is changing while we speak, so if you have a thing for printing, books, semantics, communications or anything remotely related to these topics, please share your thoughts with like-minded people.

Thank you!

Are you a “newbie” who wants advice about getting something printed?

Please post!

Are you just thinking about the future of printing and/or communication and want to exchange viewpoints with others?

Hope to hear from you soon!

Are you a diehard non-reader by choice and feel that books are…at best…odorous, tree-wasting remnants of a bygone or almost bygone age?

Feel free to rant and rave. Just try to spell something correctly!

Are you in the business of printing, publishing, writing, editing, bookselling, or bookstore browsing for fun or profit?

The way we process conventional alphabets and glyphs is changing while we speak, so if you have a thing for printing, books, semantics, communications or anything remotely related to these topics, please share your thoughts with like-minded people. This is an ongoing post about the past, present and future of printing…commercial, offset, digital, letterpress, post-press, Photoshop, Illustrator and  everything / anything else that is either directly or indirectly related to printing.

Are you a “newbie” who wants advice about getting something printed?

Please post!

Are you just thinking about the future of printing and/or communication and want to exchange viewpoints with others?

Hope to hear from you soon!

Are you a diehard non-reader by choice and feel that books are…at best…odorous, tree-wasting remnants of a bygone or (hopefully) almost bygone age?

Feel free to rant and rave. Please, just try to spell something correctly (LOL)!

Are you in the business of printing, publishing, writing, editing, bookselling, or bookstore browsing for fun or profit?

The way we process conventional alphabets and glyphs is changing while we speak, so if you have a thing for printing, books, semantics, communications or anything remotely related to these topics, please share your thoughts with like-minded people.