In planning any calendar printing venture, the most obvious fact to concentrate to is that each calendar is a time-sensitive product with a built-in distribution deadline. For the standard 2014 calendar, if your calendar is just not ultimately person’s fingers before January 1, 2014, they could already have found an alternative. For a non-standard calendar that deadline could also be sooner (eg., a school-year calendar needs to be in the user’s fingers close to the start of school if it is going to be helpful to them). Working backwards from this absolute deadline can give you a very good timeline for your complete undertaking.
How are you getting your calendars into the top person’s fingers? 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 will have to have calendars in hand. Or possibly you’re mailing them out to your clients or members; in that case you simply must make sure you allow enough time for inserting into envelopes, adding a canopy letter, addressing and mailing. Or contemplate having the printer or an area mailhouse handle mailing the calendars – it’s going to in all probability be cheaper and easier for you. Just ensure you discover out from the printer or mailhouse how much extra time they will need and issue it in.
If, however, you intend to print a calendar and sell it, either as a nonprofit fundraiser or as a profit-making venture, then distribution is a little more complicated. How a lot time you need for gross sales is dependent upon your gross sales strategy. Are you selling at a local competition or other occasion? If that’s the case, then that gives you a deadline, but keep in mind that you’ll be higher off if you happen to can sell at multiple events, in case attendance or sales at one occasion aren’t what you count on. Or perhaps you’re having volunteers sell calendars to family and friends or door-to-door. If that’s the case, you must allow a minimum of two weeks, and ideally as much as four weeks, since volunteers all have their own totally different schedules, and a few will want reminders and encouragement.
For those who print a calendar that you plan to sell, you should make sure to develop and implement a solid marketing plan. Marketing does not have to add to the overall duration of the calendar mission – you’ll be able to and may start advertising and marketing throughout the planning and production levels of the venture. However, should you wait to begin marketing till you have the calendars in hand, then you will want to allow at the very least a few extra weeks, perhaps extra, to your advertising message to reach the meant audience and inspire them to purchase.
The manufacturing part of a calendar printing undertaking begins once you hand off all the photos, text, logos, promoting, and so on. to the printer, and the printer turns it into calendar paintings for you to approve and then places it on the press and delivers to you the finished product. Be sure to discuss to your printer early on to fins out how lengthy this takes. In our case at Yearbox, it’s often about three weeks (generally sooner you probably have a selected deadline). Should you anticipate last-minute changes or additions, or if you can be proofing by committee, then you need to in all probability permit a little bit additional time – perhaps a month in whole – for manufacturing.
