Bespoke Business Printing: Where Do I Start?

Bespoke business printing is necessary when creating media for any event or marketing campaign. By working with an experienced print provider, you’ll be able to create visually impressive print work you can use to wow any potential customer or client. 

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But what do you do before signing on the dotted line?

  1. Determine Your Wants and Needs
  2. Explore Stocks and Finishes
  3. Create a Timeframe
  4. Pick a Print Method
  5. Choose a Print Partner

1. Determine Your Wants and Needs

Start by brainstorming some ideas to determine your wants and needs. Without a defined reason for your print, it can be harder to create any artwork throughout the print process. This reason is the context for each step of your journey towards a finished artwork.

Why Do You Need Print?

Are you attending an event and need promotional material? Are you looking for advertorial pieces to display around a city? Do you want to create informative leaflets to hand to both clients and potential customers to give them extra information?

Decide this first so you can see which print types, numbers and methods fit your needs so you have the most accurate and efficient artworks.

How Many Will You Need?

If you need promotional material for an event, magazines to sell, brochures for showrooms or leaflets, you’ll probably need large amounts. But each of these events will require specific quantities, depending on certain factors. To get a rough estimate, ask yourself these questions

  • Is your print to advertise or distribute?
  • Is your print small or large?
  • If the print is for an event, what kind of footfall do you expect?

2. Explore Stocks and Finishes

Stocks and finishes are crucial elements to decide on. Picking the correct medium and style to print with can elevate your artworks, not only in terms of visual impact but also practicality. 

Stocks

There’s an impressive amount of different paper stocks available in the market. Each of them differs in composition, weight and purpose. For example, 90gsm (grams per square metre) bond paper is perfect for office printing. A 130gsm matte coated paper is great for brochures and magazines. Ask yourself what you want to get from your print in terms of practicality:

  • Are you creating durable printed media?
  • Do you want your media to be thick or thin?
  • In terms of environmental impact, do you want to create your media from recycled or carbon balanced materials?

Your custom business printing partner should advise you on all of these.

Finishes

A finish is the coating or stylistic element that’s added to your stock. They can enhance the paper, increase the lifespan - or both. Like with stock types, there are plenty for you to choose from:

  • Embossed or debossed finish.
  • Matte and metallic foil.
  • Matte laminate.
  • Saddle-stitch.
  • Anti-scuff laminate.
  • Soft-touch laminate.
  • Gloss laminate.
  • Spot UV varnish.
  • JET varnish/Scodix.

Each finish guarantees a different visual impact and advantage, so it’s good to explore each type in detail. 

If you’re creating media in brochure or leaflet form containing multiple pages, you can also ask yourself what kind of binding options are available. For example, you may want to choose the modern PUR bound, practical spiral bound or traditional singer sewn binding. 

3. Create a Timeframe

Include a rough timeframe after deciding the basics as it gives you more time to explore all your options and come to an initial design conclusion. 

The sooner you start preparing to use custom business printing, the better. You don’t want to be two weeks away from an event without any print on its way. The best timeframes are the ones that are flexible. 

Within this time frame, make sure you allow for proofing. A good print provider will send a proof back to a client to be approved before sending the job to print. This minimises the chance of any mistakes. However, if any mistakes are noticed, the time need to be allowed for any corrections. Fortunately, if anything does impact your print run, you and your print provider will have enough time to find a solution.

4. Pick a Print Method

Like stock types and finishes, print methods vary and offer different benefits. You can choose from a variety of different print methods, such as:

Each method works for a specific printing need. If you want to create a building wrap, choose large format. Or if your event requires three-dimensional promotional materials, choose 3D printing - that’s a no brainer. 

The right print provider will be able to advise you in your search for the most appropriate printing method for your needs. Through understanding a client’s needs, a print provider will make sure the quality, quantity and price is right for you. 

The most common types for printing media such as brochures, leaflets and posters are digital printing and litho. Digital refers to smaller jobs that use inkjet and laser printers. It’s a cost-effective and quick process.

Our litho press is especially brilliant as it is LED UV, it uses ultraviolet light to dry inks quickly. This means it has less time to seep into the stock, retaining its vibrant colours more efficiently.

As each print method performs best for different needs, return to your starting point when choosing one. What are your needs and which method fulfils them? The best way to determine this is by speaking to a print provider.

5. Choose a Print Partner

After you’ve come up with the initial design and plan, it’s time to choose a print partner. In this step, you’ll need to stay aware of the signs of a good partner and a bad one.

Try to find a print provider who offers sound advice on your ideas, offering feedback on your design choices, needs and the overall feasibility of the project. The best print providers are ones that can advise on your custom business printing needs and then create something that you can be really proud of. They'll also be on-time and cost-effective where you can rely on them again and again.

Take a look at the range of brilliant print services we offer, and if you're still not sure get in touch, with over 60 years experience we can give you trustworthy advice.

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You’re probably well aware of the growing importance and demand of eco-friendly products.

Modern technology has made these kinds of items increasingly cheaper to produce and more visually appealing. They’re a great way of lowering your business’ environmental impact - but how exactly do you produce the best kind of print using these methods?

Our checklist will give you the best advice for creating an impactful sustainable print solution.

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