To create a strong, professional brand, I will need to apply the same visual identity to all of the products that I produce. Materials used in letterheads are very important, there are lots of types and thickness of paper that can be used depending on style and design of the actual letter. I spoke to a company Marqetspace, they mass produce trade printing from business cards to letterheads to flyers and asked them to send me examples of the different types of paper that they print on. A couple of things i learnt from actually receiving the products were that thickness generally provides the user with a sense of quality and luxury while the opposite is said for the thinner pieces of paper.
Above are pictures of all the different cards that they sent me and it allowed me to actually touch the cards, feel the material and have a deeper understanding of how they different card effects the overall feel of the brand. I found the “600gsm uncoated” card to feel the most professional out of all the examples I was given.
This is the book which had a sample of all the different card types from G.F. Smiths which had a bigger selection to choose from. In this book I was given during my visit there is a large collection of different colours, transparencies, gloss, coating, thicknesses and materials. I selected my favourites, cut them out the book and you can see them here;
The first one that I decided I liked was the Softy White 380gms, the reason for this is that the thickness makes it feel like it has a real luxury quality to it. The front is covered with a soft fabric which makes it nice to touch, if a clever design was printed on the front it would make it a really interesting card.
The second one I chose the Peregrina Classics 336gsm because its reflective shade of red on the front making it stands out from all the other materials in the book. It still has a quality thickness and comes across as very professional card before it’s even been printed on.
Another nice material was the woodside garden pine, this is styles as wood and you can seed it almost blends in with my wooden table, the only issue with this card is that there isn’t much of a contrast between the silver typography which makes it difficult to read, especially in low light conditions. That being said the thickness is the highest at 398gsm so it does have a quality feel, so it would depend on your trade as to whether you wanted to use this card.
The most professional of the cards I liked was the Loreenzo White 220 gsm as it was a plain white card with a very subtle design on it using a very small layer of fibres on it. This card is probably the one out of the four that would be most widely used in the market as it isn’t too extreme and can easily be printed on.
It is important to have a creative business card design as it would help promote you and make you look better than your competitor if your card is better than theirs. First impressions count, and the right business cards will improve that. A good card works around of the them of area of business, this fitness trainer has hit the nail on the head by allowing the client to tear of the fat mans stomach to make them thinner – the whole purpose of going to gym.
The design below is really interesting and could be used as inspiration for my business card as my logo is a graph, It could be a purple card in a black envelope which has holes in the shape of my logo. Then when the card is pulled out they have my details on the back. This card gives the client a nice visual experience.
Again relating the card to you specific business is what the best business cards do, you can see this picture frame company business card uses a frame with the details printed on the back;
This plumber has created miniature plungers with his details as one way to stand out from the rest, so there are a ways to stand out out that dont even use the tradition print method, this is an interesting way;
This business card is very professional as instead of being made from paper it is actually made from dried meat which suits the company perfectly as they work in there area of survival training.
References:
akbrodie.wordpress.com 