We are excited to FINALLY get our business cards, letterhead, and envelopes printed.  They were a bit expensive (especially the business cards).  As you can see by the included photos, the business cards were “die-cut” which means they were custom cut.  Anything with the word “custom” means more $$$.  But, I think they were well worth it.  Check them out:

Our Printed Collateral

Sometimes you have to spend money to make money, and memorable business cards are a great place to start.  My only complaint is the color is a bit off on the letterhead and envelopes.  Turns out my designer didn’t include the same color profile in the adobe illustrator files for the envelope and letterhead that he did in the business card file, and that appeared to be the reason why the business card color came out okay, but the others did not.  I partially blame myself for not spending more time to check.

Unfortunately Illustrator is not one of my stronger programs, so I didn’t figure it out until more troubleshooting later (for a different issue). I also lay a little responsibility on the printer.  They were nice enough to offer re-prints and did several runs, but they were stubborn on trying a different file or file type as their definition of a “new job” is by file type and not by content, which I respectfully disagree with.  Also, being that they deal with digital files all the time, you would think they would have noticed that one file had the color profile and the others didn’t.

Like everything in life, you learn from your mistakes and move on.  Not much damage was done, and thankfully out of the three things I had printed, the one that will get the most exposure is the one without the color issues.  At some point, I’ll have more printed, and I’ll be more aware of that next time.  I’m sure this will not be the last mistake I make in building this new business, and all I can do is listen, and learn moving forward.