In planning any calendar printing project, the most obvious truth to pay attention to is that every calendar is a time-sensitive product with a built-in distribution deadline. For a standard 2014 calendar, in case your calendar will not be in the long run user’s palms before January 1, 2014, they may already have found another. For a non-standard calendar that deadline could also be sooner (eg., a school-year calendar needs to be within the person’s arms close to the start of faculty if it is going to be helpful to them). Working backwards from this absolute deadline can provide you timeline for the entire project.
How are you getting your calendars into the end consumer’s hands? Are you giving them away? In that case, then it ought to be comparatively straight-forward to determine the distribution logistics and determine by what date you have to to have calendars in hand. Or maybe you might be mailing them out to your customers or members; in that case you just must be sure to permit enough time for inserting into envelopes, including a canopy letter, addressing and mailing. Or consider having the printer or a local mailhouse deal with mailing the calendars – it is going to probably be cheaper and simpler for you. Simply make sure you discover out from the printer or mailhouse how a lot extra time they may need and factor it in.
If, however, you plan to print a calendar and sell it, either as a nonprofit fundraiser or as a profit-making venture, then distribution is a bit more sophisticated. How a lot time you want for gross sales depends on your gross sales strategy. Are you promoting at an area competition or different event? In that case, then that gives you a deadline, but remember that you will be higher off if you happen to can promote at a number of events, in case attendance or sales at one event usually are not what you expect. Or perhaps you might be having volunteers sell calendars to family and friends or door-to-door. If so, you should enable not less than two weeks, and ideally as much as four weeks, since volunteers all have their own different schedules, and a few will want reminders and encouragement.
Should you print a calendar that you plan to sell, you should make sure to develop and implement a strong advertising and marketing plan. Advertising does not have so as to add to the general duration of the calendar mission – you possibly can and will begin advertising through the planning and production levels of the venture. Nonetheless, in case you wait to start advertising until you might have the calendars in hand, then you will want to permit not less than just a few extra weeks, maybe extra, on your advertising and marketing message to reach the meant viewers and inspire them to buy.
The manufacturing phase of a calendar printing venture starts whenever you hand off all the pictures, text, logos, promoting, etc. to the printer, and the printer turns it into calendar art work so that you can approve after which puts 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 is often about three weeks (typically sooner when you have a selected deadline). In the event you anticipate last-minute modifications or additions, or if you’ll be proofing by committee, then it’s best to probably allow a bit additional time – possibly a month in whole – for production.
