Traditional Offset Printing

When one considers traditional offset printing, the question that needs to be asked is, "How many colors?" The following are the options to consider:

• One spot color, often times just black ink
• Two spot colors, often black plus one spot color (PMS – Pantone Matching System)
• Three or four color spot colors
• Four-color process printing, simulates up to 16 million colors which are made from Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black inks (CMYK)

Multi Media Services has 7 specialty offset presses available to produce your work:

• Ryobi 3304 automated four-color press (Portrait feed) PRINTS FULL-COLOR IN ONE PASS!
• Ryobi 3302 two-color press (Portrait feed)
• AM Multi 1520 two-color offset press (Landscape feed)
• ABDick 9810 with T51 second color head (Portrait feed)
• ABDick 9810xc with T51 second color head (Portrait feed)
• Ryobi 975PFA perfector press prints 1/1 (Portrait feed), prints both sides at the same time

Effective Use of Color

Each additional color in your document will increase your cost, however, the power of your message will be magnified many times over. The desired outcome of most printed pieces is a measured response, whether it be a purchase, a call or a a survey that's filled in and returned. It is important to weigh the additional cost of printing a full-color piece with the additional increase in response rates associated with a full-color piece.

Response rates for a direct mail piece vary from .05% to 12% depending on how well the audience is targeted and how influential the piece is. Effective use of color can dramatically increase response rates.

For example, let's say you are trying to promote a product or service with a gross margin of $100. A b/w (black and white) postcard garners a 2% response on 3,000 pieces (60 responses). If the piece cost $480 then the cost per response would be $8 ($480/ 60) A full-color piece is sent out at a cost of $1,000 and the response rate is 7%. The number of responses would be 210 (7% of 3,000 pieces) and the cost per response would be $4.76 ($1,000/210) or almost half of the cost for the black and white piece!

If 10% of those who responded bought the product, then the results would be as follows:

• B/W had 60 responses x 10% = 6 sales. 6 sales x $100 gross margin per piece = $600. Subtracting the cost of $480 from the $600 gross margin leaves $120 in profit OR a 25% return on your investment.
• Full-color had 210 responses x 10% = 21 sales. 21 sales x $100 gross margin per piece = $2,100. Subtracting the cost of $1,000 from the $2,100 gross margin leaves $1,100 in profit OR more than 100% return on your investment.

FULL COLOR MAKES CENTS!