In planning any calendar printing undertaking, the most obvious fact to pay attention 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 will not be ultimately consumer’s fingers earlier than January 1, 2014, they may have already got discovered an alternate. For a non-standard calendar that deadline may be sooner (eg., a school-year calendar must be in the consumer’s arms close to the start of college if it is going to be useful to them). Working backwards from this absolute deadline may give you a good timeline for the whole venture.
How are you getting your calendars into the end consumer’s arms? Are you giving them away? If that’s the case, then it should be comparatively straight-forward to determine the distribution logistics and decide by what date you will need to have calendars in hand. Or perhaps you’re mailing them out to your customers or members; in that case you just have to ensure you allow enough time for inserting into envelopes, adding a cover letter, addressing and mailing. Or consider having the printer or a local mailhouse handle mailing the calendars – it will probably be cheaper and simpler for you. Simply be sure you find out from the printer or mailhouse how much additional time they are going to need and factor it in.
If, on the other hand, you intend to print a calendar and promote it, both as a nonprofit fundraiser or as a profit-making venture, then distribution is a little more sophisticated. How a lot time you need for gross sales depends on your sales strategy. Are you selling at a local festival or other occasion? If that’s the case, then that gives you a deadline, however keep in mind that you may be higher off should you can sell at multiple events, in case attendance or gross sales at one event are not what you anticipate. Or maybe you might be having volunteers sell calendars to family and friends or door-to-door. If so, you must permit at least two weeks, and preferably up to four weeks, since volunteers all have their very own completely different schedules, and some will need reminders and encouragement.
In case you print a calendar that you simply plan to promote, you must make sure to develop and implement a strong advertising and marketing plan. Marketing does not have so as to add to the general length of the calendar mission – you can and will begin advertising and marketing through the planning and production phases of the mission. Nonetheless, if you happen to wait to begin marketing until you have got the calendars in hand, then you will want to permit at the least a couple of further weeks, perhaps more, on your marketing message to succeed in the meant audience and encourage them to purchase.
The manufacturing phase of a calendar printing mission begins when you hand off all the images, text, logos, promoting, and so on. to the printer, and the printer turns it into calendar paintings for you to approve after which places it on the press and delivers to you the finished product. Be sure to discuss to your printer early on to fins out how long this takes. In our case at Yearbox, it is normally about three weeks (typically sooner when you’ve got a specific deadline). In case you anticipate last-minute adjustments or additions, or if you can be proofing by committee, then it is best to most likely permit slightly further time – possibly a month in total – for production.
