Brochure Printing

Whether you're selling your company's services or shopping for a brand new ride, everyone loves a well-designed and nicely printed color brochure. And with the ubiquitous nature of the desktop computer, the ability to print color brochures has fallen into the hands of the masses.

Historically speaking, this hasn't been the case for long ...

The advent of the Apple Macintosh and Adobe PostScript in the late 1980's forever changed the field of printing and publishing. The mystical and arcane world of the graphic arts opened up a whole new world of design and production. Nowadays, your design can go right from your computer, through the Internet, to the color brochure printer. As someone that lived through (and wrote about) the printing revolution, I can say that few folks thought (way back when), that this would ever be possible.

If you're thinking of designing your own color brochure, with your primary motivation being the money you think you'll save, I'd like to suggest that you take some time to consider the consequences. As fast as it can happen, designing and preparing a brochure for print is not a task to be taken lightly ...

Here it is, straight out:

If you produce a poorly designed brochure, the money you (might think you) save will be far outweighed by the ultimate costs. I've been in the design trenches for over twenty years. I've seen the same mistakes made by inexperienced designers being made over and over. And I've seen far too many printed brochures get rerun because of easily avoidable (and expensive!) errors.

The first stop for the burgeoning designer with a project in mind: hook up with an excellent brochure printer while you are still in the planning stage. Let the printer know what you need and what you hope to spend, keeping in mind that your needs and budget may be far out of line. If you have a good account exec, they will help you get the job done right.

I learned an old adage early in my design career.

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.

Decide which pair are most important to you, whether it's price and speed, price and quality, or quality and speed ... and let your brochure printing company know what you expect.