Letterhead: should it be printed in house or professionally?

Whatever your company does, regardless of its size, location or industry, it will need to communicate with vendors and customers through the printed word. Using well-designed letterhead increases the chances that your correspondence will make a good impression.

If your company sends out a lot of correspondence, it will probably make sense to have your letterhead printed professionally. However, if your needs are more modest, you may find that printing the letterhead as needed from your office computer makes more sense. We’ve outline the Pros and Cons of each option to help you make an informed decision.

Professionally printed letterhead: advantages and disadvantages

PROS

1. The main benefit of having letterhead printed professionally is print quality. A professional printer will have high end equipment so the final output will be strong, deep and crisp.
2. Another thing to keep in mind is that a professional printer will be able to guide you through the technical pitfalls of creating your own letterhead. Should you use CMYK or RGB? Should you output to PDF or print directly from the document?
3. A professional printer can help you determine the right paper for your design. Should you use text or cover stock? How does using recycled paper affect output quality? Should you use satin, smooth, felt, linen, laid, or cotton paper? Your printer can show you samples and make recommendations based on your specific requirements.
4. Finally, having the letterhead printed professionally allows your design to bleed off the page. Many home and small office printers will won’t print to the edge, leaving at least a quarter-inch margin (white space) all the way around.

CONS

1. One disadvantage of printing letterhead before you need it is its permanence. Move your location, change your phone number or email address, and your letterhead becomes outdated.
2. Most companies impose a minimum print run of 500-1000 copies. If this is more than you can use in a reasonable period of time, the paper is at risk of becoming discolored or curled.
3. Printing more than you need right away means finding a place to store the extras.

Digital letterhead printed at your office: advantages and disadvantages

PROS

1. One big advantage of having digital letterhead printed on demand is content flexibility. Since this option prints each piece from the original digital file, you can change contact information, logos and tag lines relatively easily.
2. Another advantage has to do with the fact that so much business correspondence today is done through email. Creating your letter digitally means that, rather than printing and scanning your finished letter, with just a couple of clicks you can save your letter as a PDF and attach it to your email.

CONS

1. The main disadvantage of printing your letterhead in-house is that the quality can suffer if you don’t have a very good printer or if your printer is low on toner.
2. As mentioned above, many office printers do not allow printing all the way to the edge. For this reason, you should decide how you will print the letterhead before you design it.

Printing your digital letterhead in-house

The easiest way to use digital letterhead is to create the design as a template in Word or Pages. To write a letter on your company letterhead, you would open a new template document. The file would be set up to prevent typing over the pre-designed letterhead and address areas.

If you’d like to talk about your letterhead needs, please call us at 518.392.0846 or email us at [email protected]. We can create an original letterhead design for professional or in-house printing.