Standard Visiting Cards for printing and photo studios

The specification

Finished size is 89 × 51 mm, so artwork should be supplied at 95 × 57 mm to include 3 mm of bleed on every edge, in CMYK at 300 DPI or better.

Production runs to 2 working days before transit.

What matters for studio operators

Passport photograph dimensions are fixed by the issuing authority and getting them wrong means the application is rejected, not merely that the print looks odd.

• Passport photo sheets and ID prints
• Rate boards and window display
• Album and frame packaging

Quantities and what they cost

100 costs ₹200 — ₹2 each — while 2000 works out at ₹1.2 each, a drop of about 40%.

The temptation is always to buy the biggest quantity, because the per-unit price falls sharply. That is only a saving if you use them before something changes — an address, a phone number, a price, a person. Order roughly nine months of realistic use.

• 100 — ₹200 (₹2 each)
• 200 — ₹340 (₹1.7 each)
• 300 — ₹480 (₹1.6 each)
• 500 — ₹700 (₹1.4 each) · most popular
• 1000 — ₹1,300 (₹1.3 each)

Preparing the artwork

Finished size is 89 × 51 mm, so artwork should be supplied at 95 × 57 mm to include 3 mm of bleed on every edge, in CMYK at 300 DPI or better.

Bleed matters if anything in your design runs to the edge. Extend the background 3 mm past the cut line on all four sides, and keep text at least 3 mm inside it, or the guillotine may take part of it.

Every file is checked automatically before it reaches a press. Anything that would print badly is blocked while it can still be fixed; anything borderline is flagged for you to decide.

• Supply as PDF, or as PNG, JPG or TIFF at 300 DPI at final size.
• Work in CMYK. RGB files are converted, which can shift bright blues and greens.
• Embed fonts, or convert text to outlines, so nothing is substituted.
• One page.

Delivery and lead time

Production takes 2 working days. Transit is added on top of that and depends on where it is going, but standard delivery costs nothing anywhere in India — distance is paid for in days rather than rupees.

Orders placed after midday start production the following working day, and the promised date always allows for that.

• Bengaluru, Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai, Kolkata, Hyderabad — about 4 working days in total.
• Tier-one cities such as Pune, Jaipur, Kochi and Chandigarh — about 5 days.
• Most other pincodes — about 7 days.
• North-east and the islands — 10 to 14 days.

The mistake to avoid

Printing to a rounded size rather than the exact specification the authority publishes.

It is worth an extra week of planning, because the alternative is paying for the run twice.

GST and invoicing

Printed matter under HSN 4911, taxed at 12%.

Prices shown are MRP and already include GST, so the figure on the product page is what gets charged. Add your GSTIN at checkout and the tax invoice carries it, along with the HSN per line and the tax split, so input credit can be claimed without a follow-up.

It is far easier to enter a GSTIN at checkout than to have an issued invoice amended afterwards.