In planning any calendar printing project, the obvious fact to concentrate to is that each calendar is a time-sensitive product with a built-in distribution deadline. For the standard 2014 calendar, in case your calendar is not ultimately person’s arms before January 1, 2014, they could have already got found an alternate. For a non-standard calendar that deadline may be sooner (eg., a school-year calendar needs to be in the user’s arms near the start of faculty if it’s going to be helpful to them). Working backwards from this absolute deadline may give you timeline for the whole project.
How are you getting your calendars into the tip consumer’s fingers? Are you giving them away? In that case, then it must be relatively straight-forward to determine the distribution logistics and decide by what date you will need to have calendars in hand. Or possibly you’re mailing them out to your clients or members; in that case you just must make sure you enable enough time for inserting into envelopes, adding a cover letter, addressing and mailing. Or take into account having the printer or an area mailhouse deal with mailing the calendars – it would in all probability be cheaper and simpler for you. Just ensure you discover out from the printer or mailhouse how a lot additional time they are going to want and factor it in.
If, then again, you intend to print a calendar and promote it, either as a nonprofit fundraiser or as a profit-making venture, then distribution is a bit more sophisticated. How much time you want for gross sales is dependent upon your sales technique. Are you promoting at an area pageant or other occasion? If so, then that offers you a deadline, but keep in mind that you’ll be better off in the event you can promote at multiple occasions, in case attendance or sales at one event are usually not what you expect. Or maybe you’re having volunteers promote calendars to family and friends or door-to-door. If that’s the case, you need to allow not less than two weeks, and preferably up to four weeks, since volunteers all have their very own totally different schedules, and some will want reminders and encouragement.
In the event you print a calendar that you simply plan to promote, you should you’ll want to develop and implement a solid advertising plan. Advertising does not have to add to the overall period of the calendar project – you can and may start advertising and marketing in the course of the planning and manufacturing levels of the undertaking. Nevertheless, when you wait to begin advertising and marketing until you’ve got the calendars in hand, then you will have to allow at the least just a few further weeks, possibly extra, to your advertising and marketing message to succeed in the supposed audience and motivate them to purchase.
The production section of a calendar printing project begins when you hand off all the photos, text, logos, advertising, etc. to the printer, and the printer turns it into calendar art work for you to approve after which places it on the press and delivers to you the completed product. Make sure you talk to your printer early on to fins out how long this takes. In our case at Yearbox, it is normally about three weeks (generally sooner in case you have a specific deadline). In case you anticipate last-minute adjustments or additions, or if you may be proofing by committee, then you should in all probability allow a little bit extra time – possibly a month in complete – for manufacturing.
