In planning any calendar printing mission, the obvious reality to concentrate to is that each calendar is a time-sensitive product with a built-in distribution deadline. For a standard 2014 calendar, if your calendar isn’t ultimately person’s palms earlier than January 1, 2014, they could already have found an alternative. For a non-standard calendar that deadline may be sooner (eg., a school-year calendar must be in the user’s arms near the beginning of college if it’s going to be useful to them). Working backwards from this absolute deadline can give you a great timeline for all the mission.
How are you getting your calendars into the top consumer’s hands? Are you giving them away? If so, then it should be comparatively straight-forward to determine the distribution logistics and determine by what date you will want to have calendars in hand. Or possibly you are mailing them out to your prospects or members; in that case you just have to ensure 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 handle mailing the calendars – it’s going to probably be cheaper and simpler for you. Just ensure you discover out from the printer or mailhouse how much additional time they’ll need and factor it in.
If, alternatively, you propose to print a calendar and promote it, either as a nonprofit fundraiser or as a profit-making venture, then distribution is a bit more difficult. How much time you want for gross sales relies on your gross sales strategy. Are you promoting at a neighborhood competition or different occasion? If so, then that offers you a deadline, however remember the fact that you will be higher off in case you can promote at a number of occasions, in case attendance or sales at one event are not what you count on. Or possibly you might be having volunteers sell calendars to friends and family or door-to-door. If that’s the case, you need to permit at the least two weeks, and preferably up to 4 weeks, since volunteers all have their very own completely different schedules, and some will want reminders and encouragement.
In case you print a calendar that you plan to sell, you must make sure you develop and implement a stable marketing plan. Advertising does not have so as to add to the overall length of the calendar undertaking – you can and may begin advertising and marketing through the planning and manufacturing stages of the project. Nevertheless, if you wait to start out marketing until you could have the calendars in hand, then you will have to permit at the very least a couple of further weeks, maybe more, on your marketing message to achieve the supposed audience and motivate them to purchase.
The production part of a calendar printing project begins when you hand off all of the photographs, text, logos, promoting, and many others. to the printer, and the printer turns it into calendar artwork for you to approve after which places it on the press and delivers to you the completed product. Be sure to speak to your printer early on to fins out how lengthy this takes. In our case at Yearbox, it’s usually about three weeks (typically sooner you probably have a specific deadline). If you anticipate last-minute adjustments or additions, or if you will be proofing by committee, then it’s best to most likely permit a little extra time – perhaps a month in total – for manufacturing.
