Business Card Printing

Need to get some business cards printed? When you mix the magic of the Internet with your favorite Windows desktop publishing and design applications you have a world of possibilities at your fingertips! In the old days, business card printing was primarily the realm of graphic designers, local print shops, and specialty printers. (And the worst part was the wait.) Nowadays, anyone with a web browser and a credit card can design and order up a stack of business cards that will be quickly printed delivered just days after you push the send button.

I've used the Internet to have two sets of business cards printed over the years. The first set was a super-fast set of black-and-white cards that I designed for myself. The second set was a full-color design that I created for a member of my family. With both projects, I received the cards in record time and at a reasonable cost ...

I designed my quick-n-dirty black and white business cards online. It was a simple point, click and type affair. While they're not fancy in any way, the cards' simplicity help them stand out from the crowd. I used Copperplate typefaces for a more formal appearance and lightened the look up a bit with a whimsical piece of clip art. In all, they've done a fine job of representing the Chief Instigating Officer of geekbooks.com.

We decided to go all out on my relative's full-color business cards. The cool retro design goes a long way to represent his company. I pulled out all the stops and used CorelDRAW to create the design, ringing all the bells and sounding all the whistles along the way. The gold gradients and spiffy highlights make the card look like a million bucks. After finishing up the design and getting the approval, I sent VistaPrint a rasterized version of the artwork -- 300 dots per inch (DPI) at the final printed size.

No matter whether you use Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Macromedia Freehand or CorelDRAW, rendering a full-rasterized version is perhaps the safest way to send full color artwork to a business card printer. Rendering a bitmap ensures that all of the image has been committed to dots (rather than vectors). And most importantly, sending a rasterized version eliminates the risk of forgetting to include individual design elements or fonts. (Just be sure to save an untouched vector version of the artwork--you may need to make changes to the business card design down the road.)

There are lots of other choices to make when printing business cards, in addition to choosing whether to print in black and white or full-color. First off, you'll need to decide if you want to print on one or both sides of the card. And you'll need to know what kind of paper stock to use. When in the printer's verison of Rome, speak like a Roman printer ... it's essential to know the nomenclature.

If you print full-color on one side and just black on the back, it's referred to as a 4/1 (four over one) job ... that is, the four process colors (CMYK - cyan, magenta, yellow, and black) on the front and just black on the back. A 4/4 (four over four) business card has full-color printing on both sides.

Most printers will provide you with your choice of paper stock. Choose carefully, because the paper stock can greatly effect the finished appearance of the business cards (as well as the cost). Full-color cards tend to look nice with coated (shiny) stock, while most cheapie black-and-white cards are printed on matte stock.

Raised lettering (or thermography) can be an elegant option for black and white cards. The raised letters are created with a post-press procedure, where the cards are dusted with powder (while still wet) and baked in a special oven. Thermography isn't nearly as popular as it once was--you may not be able to find it at many online printers. Thermography might add a day or days to the delivery time, as well.

Needless to say, if you're thinking about printing business cards with an online service, be sure to shop around. There are lots of great deals out there, but there are some that may sound too good to be true, too. If you want the most color for the least amount of money, watch for business card printers that offer a discount on their cards if you allow them to print their logo and contact information on the back of the card.