New Year Planning: Business Cards

Happy New Year to all!

I'm going to admit my resolution publicly, in hopes that it will help me follow through. I'm resolving to plan ahead more in the coming year, although acknowledging that I can't always be ahead of the curve. By working to get many things done far ahead, rather than procrastinating to the last minute, I'll have more options for those times when I do get caught by the dawdling bug.

As a show of my good intention, this blog post was written and scheduled two days ago. That was the day I finally decided to submit my new business cards for printing. Imagine! I don't really NEED these for months probably -- for the Bead & Button Show definitely, but I don't need them now. But think of all the opportunities I'll have to distribute them that I wouldn't have been able to take advantage of if I waited until the spring to print them.


I actually had the front of the card all finished before, and had even printed them at home on my photo printer on Avery business cards. My excuse was that I could change them frequently without a large investment, but I also always wound up printing them right before a show. The notion that I wanted double-sided cards sent me searching for other possibilities though.


For the cost of a pack of 100 cards, not to mention ink and my time investment, I was able to order 1000 double-sided business cards from CopyCraft. I used these printers for my postcards last year that turned out really well and were also reasonably priced. Next time I do a postcard I'm going to do double-sided also.

CopyCraft makes it easy to upload Photoshop files to their website, then they will place the trim marks and PDF for the printer. Double-sided glossy 4-color printing for $34 + shipping is hard to beat. Ask for Jason Willis, if you decide to give them a try.

To see instructions for how I layout my business cards in Photoshop, see my previous post on business cards. Those instructions are accurate for the print-at-home cards, but need some size revisions for the pro printer version, since they need a bleed area that will be trimmed off. For that purpose, make the file size 2.25" x 3.75" and crop photos to 675x750 pixels for insertion. Make sure text doesn't extend into the 1/8" trim area around the edge. Enjoy!