Get good print results for your charity
There is nothing worse for us as designers than seeing a charity get their marketing material professionally designed but then cut corners by printing the material on their office printer. This often seems like a good idea but the reality is that the printing standard you end up with is poor and the amount you spend in consumables (ink cartridges and paper) can often amount to the cost of getting the material printed professionally.
This week’s Charity Design Tip looks to help you choose the right printing process to get the most cost effective quotes when getting your charity’s promotional material printed professionally.
When looking at printing promotional material it is important to understand there are two main types of printing available, lithographic and digital. Lithographic printing is mainly used when you require high volumes of printed materials. The quality of lithographic printing has historically been much better than digital but in the past decade the standard of professional digital printing has increased rapidly. Digital printing gives charities an excellent opportunity to print smaller quantities without the set-up fees of lithographic printing.
The best way for me to help you understand whether you should use digital or lithographic printing is to break them down separately.
Digital printing:
1. Digital printing can let you specify whether you want to print one or lots of units with no set-up fees, whereas lithographic printing has high set-up fees and is only cost effective for larger print runs. So with a charity’s print run of 100 leaflets, digital printing can offer a very competitive quote.
2. Paper is measured in GSM (grams per square metre): the lower the number the lighter the paper. An average business card is printed on 300gsm paper whereas your average leaflet is printed on 120gsm. Digital printing can usually only print up to 300 gsm whereas lithographic can print on heavier card if required.
3. Digital printing has very quick turnaround so if you need your leaflet in a hurry this could be the option for you.
4. Most printing jobs are printed in CMYK (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black). Some charity logos specify pantone colours: these are special solid colours and cannot be printed on a digital press as digital printing only prints in CMYK.
Lithographic printing:
1. Lithographic printing is the right choice for printing high quantities of units. Using this printing method can seriously reduce the cost per unit.
2. A lithographic press usually prints straight CMYK jobs but has the ability to add a special solid pantone colour, so if your charity has a specific corporate colour this can be catered for whereas with digital printing this is unavailable.
To conclude, if you have a small quantity of units to print, digital printing will give you the most cost effective quotes. If you require over 500 units lithographic printing may be the best way forward to bring the cost per unit down.
The most important thing to say is get at least three quotes. The cost of printing can vary depending on the printer: some printers are set up to handle large print runs, some specialise in smaller print runs. Also get to know your printer: if you don’t feel you are in good hands there are plenty of other printing companies who would want the work.
This may sound like a plug for agencies, but sometimes with your most important jobs, get your agency to handle the print. They know what to look for when proofing a document and where to find the most cost effective quotes; but like us I am sure they will always be happy to help if you have any questions about sourcing print yourselves.
Comments
Very useful article. Until recently, I would only have considered using professional printers for anything over a thousand copies - since I only knew about litho printing. Digital printing offers the same high quality - but is an affordable option for small print runs of between 100-1000 copies. The quality is so much better than anything we've ever produced on our colour laser printer - so digital printing has given us the ability to maintain a consistent high quality across all our print jobs - large and small.
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