Who to trust with your business printing?
August 12th, 2008
Print Media
Recently over the last week or so I have been scouting a place to print business cards, and prices online range from 10-20$ for 250, and in person the price ranges from 50-100$. And i understand that online businesses have less over-head, but this price gap is absolutely insane!
I do not necessarily trust online ordering for collateral and business or design materials because the turn around time on a mistake is huge, and costly (And neither should you) And have decided that ordering in person at a local store is probably the best bet in service, the only difference is price varies from 50-100$ for the same service depending where you go.
So over the past few days I have priced out a few major chain stores, and will list the average price, turn around time and some more useful information for those of you who are or will be interested in where to get printing done.
- FedEx/ Kinko’s - Costs ~$1.80 for 1 Sheet of, glossy, single sided full color, with 8 or 10 on a page depending if there is a bleed, additional flat $13.50 for cutting, even if you only have a few. So around 250 would close about ~$65 final price, same day, and reliable helpful service. They offer a variety of packages to save money if you order multiple products.
- Minute Men Press - This is quite a large chain of printing services, and have tons of setores nation wide. They cost from .50-79 cents a sheet depending on paper, with 8 or 10 on a page, full color single sided. They charge an EXTRA 10$ for a RIP fee which they say is mandatory so they can check colors(I asked if i brought in a final proofed PSD or PFD and said they must check colors)..and then a flat $15 cutting fee. So 250 would cost ~50$ They also offer packages for 500 and up starting at $69.99, the service at this location seems adequte and fast turn around.
- Vista Print - This is an online store that seems quite successful at what they do, there is a promotion going for new customers and you can get business cards for ‘free’ or 3.99 for custom loaded. They claim this price, but their shipping costs are extremely over priced, from $8-25. A final price for a one sided, matte, full color business card with a custom loaded image was about $18 with shipping, the major down fall is 7-14 business days of shipping, and if you want it sooner the cost will range anywhere from $18-40. I have read many bad things about Vista print claiming their images are of low quality, and sometimes prints come out looking mediocre-the last thing you want to do is hand out and embarrassing business card or flyer.
- Various local print shops - I priced around at a few local print shops, and most of them charged a $25 set up/proof fee, then similar rates to the ones above. I love to support small businesses, but when their costs are 25-50% higher than that of others it is hard to justify.
The conclusion is I’m going to order my business cards locally from Minute Men Press, they seem to provide a lower cost, and offer the ability to proof and test the images / final product in person. For future use in printing collateral I will most likely order them online in large bulk, or go with one of FedEx’s printing packages. My business does provide logo and print design and will reccomend the services listed above.
