Custom Business Card Designs – Things to Know Before You Buy

Buying a custom business card design is apparently not too difficult task but still it could be much

more easier and beneficial if you knew the metrics to checkout before you actually do it.

Here are 4 essential things you should consider while buying a custom business card design:

1. Shape of Your Desired Business Card

2. Print material

3. Business Card Size &

4. Design format

Shape of your business card:

There are two types of business cards by shape, either die-cut or conventional business card. Before

you get a custom business card design, bear in mind which one you want for your business and create

your design brief accordingly.

• Die-cut business cards

Die-cut business cards are special type of business cards which are not rectangular in shape.

Die-cut business cards need to be printed using more sophisticated printing machinery and

hence if you choose a design suitable for die-cut business card, it will cost you more than

conventional business cards.

Die-cut business cards come in various shapes ranging from simple circle to undefined ones.

So you will also need to specify its shape and dimensions in your design brief for a perfect

custom design.

• Conventional business cards

Conventional business cards are simple rectangle shaped business cards. Almost of them are

same in size, usually 3.5×2 inches. However, if you want some twist with it, you can opt for

different print materials other than regular paper.

So if you are going for conventional business card, also specify its size and material in your

design brief. It will help designers prepare the best design for you.

Business card print material:

By the types of material, there are many possibilities for business cards but consider your budget and

estimate the cost for your preferred type of business card material. It will help you figure out what’s the

best type of business card for you. Based upon type of used material, there are following types of

business cards:

• Paper business cards

Paper business cards are easily available anywhere both online and offline. If you are

considering cost-effectiveness, regular paper business cards are quite cheaper compared to all

other types of business cards.

Paper business cards can be textured, glossy, matte or regular finished. Choose the one that

suits best to your business personality & budget and get your business card design made

accordingly.

• Plastic business cards

Plastic business card can be transparent or non-transparent. Though transparent plastic

business cards look quite appealing, you should bear in mind that such cards are usable only

with one of its side. As you print on one side, another side of card will become useless for

design purpose.

So choose transparent business card designs only if you need fewer details to be displayed

and a simple business card design with minimal graphics. Also specify in your brief if you need

business card design for transparent plastic material or the regular plastic material.

• Metal business cards

In very rare case, metal business cards are advised as they are quite costly and hard to carry

with and handover to others. If you are a kind of business that is rough and sluggish in nature,

metal business cards can be ideal for you, otherwise it’s not recommended at all.

• Wooden business cards

Wooden business cards are beautiful and looks sophisticated. So if you are running a highly

professional business related to luxurious entities, you can go for wooden business cards.

For example, an interior designer’s business card would look great if its made of wooden

material. If you are to choose wood as print material for your business card, ask your designers

for business card mock ups made using wooden material.

If you have any other material in your mind other than paper for your business card, Ask your

printers first if they provide prints on that materials or not.

In either case they do provide or not, clearly describe in your design brief which kind of material

you are going to use for your business card.

Also ask your designers to give you design previews for the very same material. For example,

if you are going to have letterpress business cards ask for letterpress business card mock ups

instead of plain designs. It will give you better idea of how it will actually look.

Business card size:

Usually business card size is 3.5×2 inches but standard business card sizes around the world are

matter of variation. See the following Wikipedia table to know more about it. In your design brief,

include your business card size too:

Design format:

When you buy business card design online, one of the major problem you might face is incompatible

design format. The business card design provided by your design should be in a printable format and

for that you have to consider following tips:

Get bleed area included in design:

Bleed area is extra part (additional border space) of design that is kept as blank design space to

accommodate with unwanted cutouts in design. Bleed area will save you from design cutouts when

you get your business card design is actually printed. Also it will be useful later when you need to

change business card size slightly.

Make sure the design format you get is print-friendly:

To ensure print-friendliness of your design,

1. consider the file format &

2. Consider image mode of design.

Most widely used print formats are .psd, .eps, .tif, .jpeg, .ai, .pdf and .png. Ask your designer which of

these formats will be available to you and discuss with your printers if they could use it for their prints.

Image mode can be CMYK, RGB or any other standard image mode but most widely used is CMYK.

So make sure that business card design supplied to you will be in CMYK mode only.

As you have chosen every aspect for your ideal business card design, now you can move to your

designer and get your business card custom designed. There are several leading graphic designing

companies available in market providing designing services for business and individual purpose.

YourDesignPick.com is one such leading graphic design company offering unique business card

designs. From our design portfolio, you can choose from 1000s of ready-made design samples and

customize it as per your needs, all at quite an affordable prices. Take a look at our business card

design portfolio for more info.