In planning any calendar printing challenge, the most obvious truth 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 just isn’t in the end consumer’s arms earlier than January 1, 2014, they might have already got found an alternative. For a non-standard calendar that deadline may be sooner (eg., a school-year calendar must be in the person’s arms close to the beginning of college if it is going to be useful to them). Working backwards from this absolute deadline can give you timeline for your entire venture.
How are you getting your calendars into the end consumer’s arms? Are you giving them away? In that case, then it must 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 are mailing them out to your customers or members; in that case you just have to make sure you allow sufficient time for inserting into envelopes, including a canopy letter, addressing and mailing. Or take into account having the printer or a neighborhood mailhouse deal with mailing the calendars – it should probably be cheaper and easier for you. Just be sure to discover out from the printer or mailhouse how much additional time they may need and factor it in.
If, alternatively, you intend to print a calendar and sell it, either as a nonprofit fundraiser or as a profit-making enterprise, then distribution is a bit more sophisticated. How a lot time you need for gross sales is determined by your sales strategy. Are you promoting at a local competition or different event? In that case, then that offers you a deadline, however remember the fact that you will be better off in case you can sell at multiple events, in case attendance or sales at one event are usually not what you anticipate. Or perhaps you are having volunteers promote calendars to friends and family or door-to-door. If that’s the case, it’s best to enable at the least two weeks, and preferably as much as 4 weeks, since volunteers all have their own totally different schedules, and some will need reminders and encouragement.
If you happen to print a calendar that you just plan to promote, you should make sure you develop and implement a solid advertising plan. Marketing does not have so as to add to the overall length of the calendar mission – you can and may begin advertising during the planning and production levels of the project. However, in case you wait to start out marketing until you will have the calendars in hand, then you have to to allow at the least a few further weeks, perhaps more, for your advertising message to succeed in the meant viewers and inspire them to purchase.
The production part of a calendar printing challenge begins while you hand off all of the photos, textual content, logos, advertising, etc. to the printer, and the printer turns it into calendar artwork for you to approve after which 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 normally about three weeks (generally sooner when you’ve got a particular deadline). In the event you anticipate last-minute changes or additions, or if you can be proofing by committee, then you should in all probability enable somewhat additional time – perhaps a month in complete – for manufacturing.