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Designing an envelope - some basic design tips. When it comes to designing a complete stationery package, many clients view their humble envelope as a ‘throw away’ - something in which the important stuff is delivered. Nothing more, nothing less. Accordingly, the design process for envelopes isn't terribly involved - simply slap on the company logo and a return address in the top left corner and we’re all set. Nothing wrong with that I suppose. But shouldn’t we look at ALL the various stationery components - business card, letterhead and envelope - as important in order to ramp up the 'ah-ha' factory? After all, isn’t an envelope the first thing many will see before viewing the enclosed letterhead and/or business card? On the other hand, there are some really important caveats to envelope design and it’s probably a good idea to understand what is, and what isn’t possible when it comes to laying out the design of an envelope, and how some designs, while visually nifty and all, may cost a small fortune to reproduce. Generally speaking, envelope printing is quite different to that of letterheads or business cards. The cast majority of the time, printers will use envelopes that have already been assembled- flaps and pockets already in place - and this can represent some unique challenges on the press. As an envelope is not completely flat, it tends to move around a little when being printed - air can get captured inside the envelope - and this is something that has to be factored into the design. Tolerances for registration are not as exacting as for other 'flat' printed pieces such as brochures, letterheads and business cards. Also, it’s very difficult, if not impossible, to use bleed printing on a 'off-the-shelf' pre-constructed envelope, any 'live art' area in the envelope design usually requires fairly healthy margins. There is a way around this if your client is set on artwork that bleeds - the envelope can be printed BEFORE construction, which is fantastic in terms of design 'freedom', but can lead to extremely expensive production charges. Generally speaking, pre-printing envelopes is out of the budget range for most small and medium sized companies. When printing standard envelopes it's also important to keep this in mind - because of the press slippage we just mentioned, it’s also best to avoid four color process printing to avoid 'tight' registration problems. It’s more effective, and economical, to utilize either a spot co lour, or even one co lour version of your client's logo and business information. That’s not to say you CAN’T feature full co lour bleed artwork on an envelope, or that you shouldn’t. It’s just going to be more expensive to print your envelopes if you choose to do so. In terms of the ingredients of a decent envelope design - that’s pretty well standardized. We have to factor in the practical applications necessary, as well as postal restrictions. We're pretty well stuck with company logo, name, return address, maybe a tag line or call to action. If there's any real estate left, we can utilize some design elements - portions of the logo or some complementary graphics. Generally speaking, we don’t put phone numbers on envelopes - though you can if you want. Recently, the debate has become whether or not to feature your client’s web address on the envelope. Sure - why not? As a rule of thumb, a company web address should be plastered onto every single scrap of paper that leaves your client's office. While an envelope is often headed for the ’round file’, the few seconds it spends in front of a potential clients eyeballs should certainly be a factor in how we design it.
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