In planning any calendar printing mission, the 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, if your calendar isn’t in the end person’s fingers before January 1, 2014, they may already have discovered an alternative. For a non-standard calendar that deadline could also be sooner (eg., a school-year calendar needs to be within the consumer’s fingers close to the beginning of faculty if it will be helpful to them). Working backwards from this absolute deadline can give you a superb timeline for your complete challenge.
How are you getting your calendars into the end consumer’s arms? Are you giving them away? In that case, then it should be relatively straight-forward to determine the distribution logistics and determine by what date you will have to have calendars in hand. Or perhaps you might be mailing them out to your clients or members; in that case you simply need to ensure you permit enough time for inserting into envelopes, including a cover letter, addressing and mailing. Or think about having the printer or an area mailhouse handle mailing the calendars – it’ll in all probability be cheaper and simpler for you. Simply be sure to discover out from the printer or mailhouse how a lot additional time they are going to want and factor it in.
If, however, you intend to print a calendar and promote it, both as a nonprofit fundraiser or as a profit-making venture, then distribution is a bit more complicated. How much time you want for sales will depend on your gross sales technique. Are you promoting at a local pageant or other event? In that case, then that provides you a deadline, however take into account that you’ll be better off for those who can sell at a number of events, in case attendance or sales at one occasion should not what you anticipate. Or possibly you’re having volunteers promote calendars to friends and family or door-to-door. If that’s the case, you must allow at the very least two weeks, and preferably up to four weeks, since volunteers all have their very own different schedules, and a few will need reminders and encouragement.
Should you print a calendar that you simply plan to promote, you must remember to develop and implement a solid marketing plan. Marketing does not have so as to add to the general length of the calendar mission – you possibly can and should start advertising and marketing during the planning and manufacturing stages of the undertaking. Nevertheless, if you happen to wait to start advertising till you could have the calendars in hand, then you have to to permit at least just a few further weeks, maybe extra, for your marketing message to achieve the supposed viewers and motivate them to purchase.
The production phase of a calendar printing challenge begins while you hand off the entire photographs, textual content, logos, advertising, and so forth. to the printer, and the printer turns it into calendar artwork so that you can approve and then puts it on the press and delivers to you the completed product. Ensure you speak to your printer early on to fins out how long this takes. In our case at Yearbox, it is often about three weeks (typically sooner when you have a specific deadline). For those who anticipate last-minute modifications or additions, or if you’ll be proofing by committee, then it’s best to most likely allow a bit extra time – perhaps a month in total – for manufacturing.
