How to save money on printing your brochure

These days there are many printers offering crazy knock down prices for printed brochures on the internet. Going for the cheapest may cost you dearly in quality. Use the following guidelines as to what you should be looking for with any printed promotional material.

Cheap and cheerful
Whichever way you look at it, printing brochures or booklets isn't going to be cheap but you would be amazed at the savings that can be made by altering job specs and opting for different print finishes. The first thing to consider when putting together a multi page booklet or magazine is to try and make the page size the most economic. Brochures are printed on flat sheets 8, 16 or 32 pages at a time depending on finished page size. Making your brochure conform to one of these standard page quantities means that assembly once printed is going to be straightforward with no wasted blank pages.

Pick a number
Another major contributing cost factor with brochures is the print run - as a rule the higher the print run the more you are going to save per unit cost. The differences between 2000 brochures and 5000 may be minimal, so it's always worth looking at a run on cost per thousand when ordering print as you may find the costs a massive saving. If you only require a few hundred copies of a booklet or leaflet then digital printing is the most cost effective solution. These days the quality of digital printing has vastly improved from some years ago. You are not paying for any print set up charges as you would with lithographic printing so for small runs this is the way to go.

Thick or thin
Depending on use, the paper stock used on any brochure is going to effect costs sometimes considerably. If the brochure is going to be mailed out to people in bulk it makes sense to keep the weight down. 130gsm-170gsm should be ample for leaflets and 250gsm-350gsm for brochure covers that require some body to them. If the brochures need to be of a particularly high quality to make a good impression it is worth splashing out on some nice finish effects for the front cover which can be printed seperately from the main inside of the brochure. Matt or gloss laminating the cover gives a very nice tactile finish to any brochure cover which is really going to make your brochure stand out from the crowd.

Going shopping
As with most things it's always a good idea to have some price comparisons when selecting a printer to print your brochure or magazine. Some printers will be using large presses and will be able to offer substantial savings on large volume brochures, whereby they may not be as competitive on smaller runs, which a smaller printer would be more capable of producing. If you do manage to get a considerably lower price on any brochure printing job, it's always worth asking the printers to send out some print samples that they've produced for other clients. If the quality of print is good and the price is low - then go for it!

Use the experts
Brochure designers have over 15 years experience working in all areas of commercial design for print. Our design work is always produced to the highest exacting standards and is supplied ready for print. There are many factors to be aware of when producing design for print such as trapping, overprinting, bleed, embedding fonts and colour correction of any images to name but a few. All of our printed work is produced by selected trade suppliers that we have worked with and built up a valuable working relationship over the years. Thanks to our excellent trade contacts and suppliers we are in a good position to use our print experience and knowledge to make good savings on print for any of our customers.