Marketing/US/Vendors

We often need Vendors to print up shirts, stickers, etc.. for us. This page describes some of the vendors and possible pricing for some of our items.

T-Shirts
We've (Robinson) ordered from Big Green T's in Lebanon, NH in the past.

Pens
Best price as of April 2014 is:
 * $155 - Branded Bic Media-Click pens (500)

Fliers and Brochures
Best price as of April 2014:


 * $68 - Flyer (8.5" x 3.66" cardstock) (1000)
 * $144 - Tri-fold brochure (8.5" x 11") (1000)

For flyers/brochures, the cost difference between 500 and 100 pieces is negligible.

Stickers
Prices vary based on material, quantity, etc. Some vendors offer better pricing on smaller orders; some offer better pricing the larger the order gets.

Also looked at Sticker Giant -- better deals for much smaller print-runs; no big savings for bigger orders.

As for stickers,
 * They're pretty universal (not translated, don't go out of date, etc)
 * Price breaks might be worth it if we want to print some and share w/Europe, etc.
 * Prices go down to $110-120 per thousand for 2500, and $60-80 per thousand for 5000

Image Prep Tips
I can't think of a single vendor who will happily take SVG files. Some will ask for EPS, some for PDF, and often CMYK-only. Print shops don't seem to be big on open standards and interoperability. If they are, it may cost you $35+ per image.

You might also need crop-marks. Grit your teeth, and get ready to learn some hackish things. Inkscape, GIMP, and Scribus will be your friends here. And a healthy dose of patience.

Read these articles for a primer on how to get your images ready for printing:
 * https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/How_to_set_CMYK_color_on_a_design_for_printing
 * http://blog.linuxgrrl.com/2013/08/12/how-to-produce-vector-eps-with-cmyk-color-using-free-software/
 * http://codewideopen.blogspot.com/2008/11/svg-chicken-and-cmyk-egg.html

Some might accept JPEG as an alternative to PDF (yeah, PNG would be better, but...). Convert to JPEG and set CMYK color profiles at the same time: