Business Cards Standard

Business Cards Standard

Keeping it simple is the most important bit of information I can give here. It is just a business card after-all. You are normally there in person handing these over so all you really need is your contact information and maybe some bullet points about the business if you have a wide range of services.

We have a few options most of which are covered in the glossary but to help you out quickly we recommend again keeping it simple. The most popular product is Silk (Sheen) 400gsm (mediumweight board)

Standard size for a UK business card is 85 x 55mm. Try and maintain a margin of 5mm and bleed of 2mm if you can please. 

Templates can be downloaded here. Where shown the red line is bleed, the black line is the trim and the magenta line is the margin.

View more images in the gallery »

We want you to be able to select the right product for you so we want to help you make the right choices with the right information and bust the jargon.

FINISHED SIZE: Mostly self explanatory but this refers to the finished size of your product which some people do not pick up on. This means that for instance when an A4 sheet is folded we will put A5 here as this is the size that it will become. We can also refer to a flat sheet size which means the size it is printed and not folded.

NO. OF COLOURS: This is how many printed colours we use. This is most commonly either black and white which is referred to as 1 colour, or full colour which is referred to as 4 colours. These are the four primary colours used for printing known as CMYK, C is CYAN, M is MAGENTA, Y is YELLOW and just to confuse you K is BLACK. These four colours are printed as various tints or solids to create a larger spectrum of colours. There are also specials that are used in Lithographic print which are called Pantone colours. These are pre mixed colours to ensure the exact printed colour is as expected. The use of pantone colours are widely used across a lot of processes so work well to create a finished article that meets the expected colour.

PAPER TYPES: We would let you know the paper or substrate that we were going to use here, often giving the grammage or weight of the product. This will be shown as GSM which is Grams per Square Metre. The weight of a product can give an indication of the thickness of the sheet but can vary by the finish of the sheet. If the sheet is coated which is often referred to as Silk (Sheen) or Gloss (Shine) the chalk that is used to coat the paper is heavy so is actually thinner than an uncoated sheet of the same grammage. There is also a product which has a light coating on one side only known as monocoated, this is used as a board for packing and greetings cards due to the light coating it is much thicker. We have a rough scale to help with the grammages of sheets which can often help choose a particular weight.

100gsm Uncoated / 130gsm Coated = Lightweight Paper 

120gsm Uncoated / 150gsm Coated = Mediumweight Paper

160gsm Uncoated / 170gsm Coated = Heavyweight Paper

200gsm Uncoated / 200gsm Coated = Lightweight Card

250gsm Uncoated / 250gsm Coated = Mediumweight Card

300gsm Uncoated / 300gsm Coated = Heavyweight Card

350gsm Uncoated / 350gsm Coated / 300gsm monocoated = Lightweight Board

400gsm Uncoated / 400gsm Coated / 330gsm monocoated= Mediumweight Board

450gsm Uncoated / 450gsm Coated / 360gsm monocoated = Heavyweight Board

FINISHING TYPES:

This area is to select a special finish rather than just the paper finish alone. You may not have all finishes available on each product but here is a list of what might be there.

Lamination: This is to cover a side or both sides of a sheet of paper with a plastic film in either a glossy, matte or soft touch option. Glossy is a shiny finish. Matt is what we would call a flat finish it matts back the colours. Soft touch is known as many things. It has a matt finish but with a feel similar to a peach skin.

Foiling: This is almost like having a colour printed but rather than an actual colour it is a metallic film that is applied in a chosen shape or lettering to enhance your print. We can either add foiling to a full colour print which will most of the time require a lamination first so we can print the colour first then laminate and put the foil on top. The other option is to just have foil on its own, this process looks amazing on a coloured card to really enhance the foil. When supplying artwork for foiling we would ask for the printed area to be shown with an extra page of just solid black and white depicting the area to be foiled.

Perforation: This is to cut through a sheet with gaps to hold the sheet together but allow for the sheet to be easily separated when needed.

The following options are typically part of the products' specification already.

Score: This is when the card or board is forced inward using a straight line form to create a point that can easily be folded without causing damage to the material or print.

Crease: Similar to a score this is using a wheel rather than a form to create the indentation to allow the print to be folded. Using a wheel can be useful for creating score lines in various directions such as boxes.

Trim: To cut the printed material in straight edges using a guillotine

Machine Cut: This is to cut out like above but with the ability to cut curves and shapes, unlike trim this is not limited to just straight edges also known as contour cutting.

Kiss Cut: Similar to Machine Cut however this just cuts the surface for things like stickers that can cut through the sticker material leaving the backing paper so the stickers can be held together and easily removed.

DELIVERY:

Simply put if you would like to have it delivered or collected from our store. We don't mind either way if it is easier for you. Please note delivery is 1-2 working days from the completion date.

Downloads

Templates can be downloaded here. Where shown the red line is bleed, the black line is the trim and the magenta line is the margin.

  Publisher File 85x55mm »

  Word File 85x55mm »

  InDesign File 85x55mm »

  PDF File 85x55mm »

Can't find what you are looking for, please email us info@gpprint.co.uk and we'll send you a file.