Printed Materials That Actually Earn Their Keep for a Local Business

Most small businesses around here print roughly the same handful of things, and a fair share of it never gets used. This is an honest look at what tends to earn its money back and what tends to sit in a box under the counter.

The things that usually pay for themselves

• Business cards — still the cheapest way to be remembered after a conversation, and the item people most often come back to reprint.
• A clear printed price list — saves the same question being answered twenty times a day, and customers trust a posted price.
• Menus, laminated — for anywhere serving food, a menu that survives being handled and wiped down outlasts several paper reprints.
• Simple signage — opening hours on the door is the single most useful thing a walk-in business can print.

The things that often do not

Large runs of flyers are the usual regret. It is tempting because the per-unit price drops sharply at volume, but a thousand flyers for a seasonal offer becomes a thousand out-of-date flyers. Printing a small batch, seeing whether it works, and reprinting costs slightly more per piece and considerably less overall.

The same applies to anything with a price on it. If your prices might move within the year, print the item without the price and display pricing separately, or accept that you are buying a short-lived print run.

A few things worth checking before a print run

• Is the phone number written exactly as a customer would dial it?
• Will this still be accurate in six months?
• Is there a version of this that works in both Thai and English?
• Do you need 100 of these, or do you need 20 and a second look?

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