In planning any calendar printing undertaking, the most obvious fact to concentrate to is that every calendar is a time-sensitive product with a built-in distribution deadline. For the standard 2014 calendar, in case your calendar isn’t in the end person’s hands earlier than January 1, 2014, they might already have discovered an alternative. For a non-standard calendar that deadline may be sooner (eg., a school-year calendar needs to be within the consumer’s arms near the beginning of faculty if it will be helpful to them). Working backwards from this absolute deadline can give you a superb timeline for all the project.
How are you getting your calendars into the end consumer’s palms? Are you giving them away? If that’s the case, then it must be comparatively straight-forward to determine the distribution logistics and determine by what date you’ll need to have calendars in hand. Or perhaps you are mailing them out to your customers or members; in that case you simply have to ensure you enable enough time for inserting into envelopes, including a canopy letter, addressing and mailing. Or take into account having the printer or a local mailhouse handle mailing the calendars – it is going to most likely be cheaper and simpler for you. Simply make sure you find out from the printer or mailhouse how much extra time they will need and factor it in.
If, however, you propose to print a calendar and promote it, both as a nonprofit fundraiser or as a profit-making venture, then distribution is a bit more sophisticated. How much time you need for sales is determined by your gross sales strategy. Are you promoting at a neighborhood competition or other occasion? If that’s the case, then that gives you a deadline, however keep in mind that you will be higher off if you can promote at a number of occasions, in case attendance or gross sales at one occasion will not be what you expect. Or possibly you’re having volunteers promote calendars to friends and family or door-to-door. If so, it’s best to permit a minimum of two weeks, and preferably as much as 4 weeks, since volunteers all have their own completely different schedules, and some will want reminders and encouragement.
In the event you print a calendar that you simply plan to sell, it’s best to be sure you develop and implement a solid marketing plan. Advertising does not have to add to the general duration of the calendar venture – you can and will start marketing in the course of the planning and production levels of the mission. Nonetheless, if you happen to wait to start out advertising and marketing until you’ve got the calendars in hand, then you will have to permit at the least just a few further weeks, maybe extra, in your advertising and marketing message to reach the intended viewers and motivate them to buy.
The production section of a calendar printing venture starts when you hand off the entire photographs, text, logos, promoting, and so forth. to the printer, and the printer turns it into calendar artwork for you to approve and then puts it on the press and delivers to you the completed product. Be sure to discuss to your printer early on to fins out how lengthy this takes. In our case at Yearbox, it is normally about three weeks (typically sooner if in case you have a specific deadline). In case you anticipate last-minute adjustments or additions, or if you’ll be proofing by committee, then it’s best to probably allow a bit of additional time – possibly a month in complete – for production.
