Business card design in Newcastle, NSW: a card people keep.

Your name, what you do, one number, and the business name. Everything past that is competing with the part somebody actually needs.

The job of a card is narrow. Somebody puts it in a pocket and rings the number days later, and the whole design question is whether the number is easy to find at that point.

What belongs on it

• Your name and what you do. The trade in plain words, because a card found three weeks later has to answer who this was.
• One phone number. The one you answer. Two numbers means somebody chooses wrong.
• The business name and the logo. So the card matches the van and the quote they will see next.
• One more thing, at most. A website, an email, or a suburb. Not all three.

Everything else that ends up on cards is competing for attention with the number. Service lists, taglines, a second address and a row of social icons each make the card busier and each stay unused.

If the logo on the card matters to you, IP Australia explains what a trade mark actually protects, which is worth knowing before you print a thousand of them.

Because trades and services still hand them over in person, and because a card is one of the few things a customer keeps. In a market this size it also gets passed to somebody else.

Cards get written off as old fashioned by people who do not finish a job on somebody's property. For a trade in Newcastle, the card left on the bench is the thing that produces the second call.

It also travels. A card on a fridge gets photographed and sent to a neighbour, which is the local version of a referral and it happens on its own.

The part worth spending on is what it feels like in the hand, because that is the only thing separating your card from the four others in the drawer.

The stock does most of it. Thickness and finish change how the card feels in a hand, and that is what people register, ahead of anything about the layout.

The printing options sound technical and mostly they are decisions about feel and cost. Only a couple make a real difference.

What the options do

• Thickness. The one people notice. A heavier card reads as a business that has been going a while, and it is a small step up in price.
• Matte or gloss. Matte can be written on, which matters for a trade quoting a price on the back. Gloss shows fingerprints.
• Special finishes. Raised ink, foil, edge colour. They look good and they cost several times the base price. Worth it for a business where the card is part of the product.
• How many. Fewer than you think. Details change, and a box of two thousand outdated cards is a common sight.

One good card in one weight of stock beats four versions nobody hands out, and the money is better spent on thickness than on a second design.

The logo as a vector file, which means it can be printed at any size without going fuzzy, the exact colour codes for print, and the details checked by somebody who did not write them. Print has no undo.

A printed mistake behaves differently to a web one. It is worth ten minutes of checking against a box of cards with the wrong number on them.

What to have

• The vector logo. The scalable original, which is what keeps the mark sharp at card size instead of soft.
• Print colour codes. Different to screen codes. A printer will ask and guessing is how a brand colour comes back wrong.
• The details, read by somebody else. Phone, email and business name. The person who typed them is the worst person to check them.
• The name as registered. Written the way it appears on your paperwork, so the card matches everything else.

Order a small run first if anything is likely to change. Cards are cheap enough that a second order costs less than a box you cannot hand out.

Gather the logo files and colour codes, decide what the one job of the card is, keep the front simple, proof it printed rather than on a screen, then order a modest quantity.

1. Gather the files

Vector logo, print colour codes, typeface names. If you do not have these, that is the actual job and it comes first.

2. Decide the one thing the card has to do

Usually get somebody to ring the number. Everything on the card is judged against that.

3. Keep the front simple

Name, trade, number, logo. If something has to go on the back, put it on the back.

4. Proof it printed, not on a screen

Print it at actual size on a home printer and hold it. Text that looked comfortable on a monitor is often too small in a hand.

5. Have somebody else read the details

Out loud, digit by digit for the phone number. This catches the mistake that costs the whole run.

6. Order a modest quantity

Enough for a year. Details change more often than anybody plans for.

Days rather than weeks once the logo files exist. If they do not, gathering them is the real job and the card is the easy part afterwards.

The order it happens in

• The files get gathered. Vector logo, print colour codes, typefaces. This is the step that stalls a card job.
• The card is designed and proofed. Printed at actual size and held, not approved on a screen.
• It gets printed. A modest run, on a stock chosen for how it feels rather than how it looks in a preview.

If the logo has to be redrawn because no vector file exists, that is a separate job and it is worth knowing before anybody promises a date.

Ask whether the print files are yours to keep, which stock is being quoted, whether you get a printed proof, and whether the same design carries onto your other pieces.

We do this work in Newcastle, so we are not neutral. These are the questions we would want asked of us.

• Do I keep the print files? Yes, on ours. Without them the next print run starts by paying somebody to rebuild the card.
• Which stock is in the quote? Thickness and finish, named. It is the choice that changes how the card feels and it moves the price.
• Do I see a printed proof? Actual size, in a hand, before the run. A screen proof hides small type.
• Does this match my other pieces? The quote, the invoice and the signage. A card designed on its own is how a business ends up with four looks.
• Am I locked in? Ours runs month to month and always has. Any arrangement you cannot leave at the end of a month is worth a second look.

If you already have a brand kit, which is a set of written rules covering the colours and the type, a card is a small job. If you do not, the card is worth doing at the same time as the rest.