Business Stationery:  Digital Printing or Offset Printing…or a combination?

In our experience, most identity packages are 2-3 spot colors and it used to be that every component (letterhead, envelopes, business cards, and labels) was printed via offset printing.  Lately, we are seeing a shift in the acceptability of using offset printing for some items and digital printing on others.  Digital printing and offset printing do not match perfectly…perhaps they never will.  So the deciding factors come down to these 2 things:

*Is the difference either within tolarable ranges, or can the package be designed in such a way to have the differences be an asset?

And

*Budget

2 recent examples of using a combination of digital printing and offset printing:

1.  Just yesterday I met with a designer that was assembling an identity package for a customer that has 2 people in their office.  Originally, they were only requesting letterhead and business cards, so the designer was considering printing both digitally.  (Note – digitally printed letterhead is a whole different subject that I will blog about later.)  However, when the client requested various sizes of envelopes as well, it was determined that the letterhead should shift to being printed offset with the envelopes, but the business cards should still print digitally.  Factors in the decision included design evaluation (it was determined the end product would be within acceptable ranges) and budget (budget was not tight, but it seemed wasteful to spend the dough where it didn’t need to be spent.)

2.  The second example is Highlight’s own stationery package.  Our recently re-designed business cards print 4 color digital on the back and 3 color offset on the front.  Our letterhead and envelopes will continue to be printed offset.  The reasons behind our decision?  It will look best produced this way – the 4 color side “pops” a bit more digitally than offset, and it allows us to showcase some of our different capabilites.

These are just a couple examples…with each stationery  package it is fun and productive to think these choices through.  If you would like to see what we can do for you, we’d be happy to either show you what we have done, or put a sample together specifically for you.  Please call us at 612.522.7600 or check out our website @ www.highlightprinting.com

The author, Lisa Bickford, president of Highlight Printing, is a veteran of the printing industry.  Since 1984 she has worked her way up through many areas of the industry before acquiring Highlight Printing in 1996 with her husband Don, who has also been in printing since the early 80’s.  The things she continues to find most satisfying are the wonderful business relationships that have developed with clients, vendors, & co-workers, and the energy that is created from challenge resolution.

This Printing Blog was launched in November, 2008, as a vehicle to share ideas, information, and innovations.