In planning any calendar printing challenge, the obvious reality 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 shouldn’t be ultimately user’s palms before January 1, 2014, they may have already got found an alternate. For a non-standard calendar that deadline may be sooner (eg., a school-year calendar needs to be within the user’s arms near the beginning of college if it will be useful to them). Working backwards from this absolute deadline may give you an excellent timeline for the entire venture.
How are you getting your calendars into the end consumer’s fingers? Are you giving them away? If so, then it must be relatively straight-forward to figure out the distribution logistics and determine by what date you will want to have calendars in hand. Or perhaps you’re mailing them out to your prospects or members; in that case you just must ensure you permit sufficient time for inserting into envelopes, including a cover letter, addressing and mailing. Or think about having the printer or a local mailhouse deal with mailing the calendars – it’ll in all probability be cheaper and easier for you. Just make sure you discover out from the printer or mailhouse how a lot further time they may need and factor it in.
If, however, you propose to print a calendar and sell it, either as a nonprofit fundraiser or as a profit-making enterprise, then distribution is a bit more complicated. How a lot time you want for gross sales depends upon your gross sales technique. Are you promoting at a neighborhood competition or different event? If so, then that gives you a deadline, however take into account that you’ll be better off in case you can sell at a number of occasions, in case attendance or gross sales at one event will not be what you expect. Or maybe you’re having volunteers sell calendars to friends and family or door-to-door. In that case, you should allow at the very least two weeks, and preferably up to 4 weeks, since volunteers all have their own completely different schedules, and a few will need reminders and encouragement.
Should you print a calendar that you plan to promote, you must remember to develop and implement a strong marketing plan. Marketing doesn’t have to add to the overall length of the calendar undertaking – you’ll be able to and should begin advertising through the planning and production phases of the undertaking. However, should you wait to begin advertising until you’ve the calendars in hand, then you’ll need to allow at least just a few extra weeks, maybe extra, to your marketing message to achieve the supposed audience and encourage them to buy.
The manufacturing part of a calendar printing project starts whenever you hand off all of the pictures, text, logos, promoting, and so on. to the printer, and the printer turns it into calendar paintings for you to approve and then puts it on the press and delivers to you the completed product. Ensure you talk to your printer early on to fins out how lengthy this takes. In our case at Yearbox, it is often about three weeks (generally sooner if in case you have a particular deadline). If you anticipate last-minute changes or additions, or if you may be proofing by committee, then you should most likely permit a bit additional time – maybe a month in total – for production.
