Color Printing

There are lots of variables when it comes to color printing. It's far too easy to spend far too much money when you're buying printing. That's why it's essential to understand the basics of why one color print job can cost twice as much as another--even when they look the same. When you get down to it, color printing isn't as easy as pressing a button. You can, however, empty out your budget that quickly ...

As I mentioned in my piece this spring on brochure printing, there are three things to consider when comparing print bids: price, quality, and speed. You should only expect to get two out of those three. All bids, and all printers are not equal. You must decide which pair are most important to you, whether it's price and speed, price and quality, or quality and speed ... and let your printing company know exactly what you expect.

Turnaround time is the first thing to consider, whether you're printing business cards,
printing t-shirts, or brochures. The faster you need your job printed, the more you will have to pay. A super rush job can easily double the cost of your project (or even worse). Plan adequately and leave plenty of time to spare.

Printing on demand can save you money on short print runs with tight turnaround times. But you need to know where the break even points are ... if you send too big a job to an on demand printer, you'll end up paying more than necessary. Print on demand is the wrong way to go for long print runs.

Errors often run up the cost of a print job, as well. You would be amazed at how many print runs have to be done a second time to fix a silly little error that should have been caught in the proofreading stage.

There are two kinds of errors: printers errors and authors alterations. If the printer makes an error that is entirely their fault, it shouldn't cost the customer. But if the author/customer makes a change or misses something in proofreading, it is entirely their responsibility. That's why it's crucial to proofread each and every piece. Make sure you have enough time built into your print schedule for multiple people to proofread the piece. Each extra set of eyes is added insurance.

When you bundle up your job to send out to the printer, make sure that everything is as it should be ... and that everything is on that CDR. The disc should include all of the source files, including layout files, images, and fonts. You may also want to check into whether your color printer uses an Acrobat PDF work flow--this can cut down on the number of problems with missing files.