Saw this on
harmonie intérieure, a home interior design company, and totally agree with its "philosophy."
Especially #3 and #5!Bethany printed the first huge batch of her envelopes last night! Exciting, isn't it? I volunteered to help her enter in 100+ addresses from a Google doc to Adobe InDesign and noticed only one typo! A missing "n" in "Vincent." Fortunately, Vincent was near the end of the list so she hadn't gotten to printing it yet. Whew!
Most people don't self-print their envelopes, but if you're on a tight budget, it's definitely the way to go. Bethany expressed that she did NOT want to print out address labels and stick them on her envelopes (they can look quite tacky), and we unfortunately do not have the privilege of knowing any naturally talented calligraphers among our friends.
So how do you do it? It was definitely a trial and error process and quite an emotional roller coaster ride. Bethany was the coaster, I was the rider.
We diligently researched anything and everything about envelopes and their printing services. From working at
tiny*prints, I knew that they printed envelopes that were included in their new Mailing Service Order option (so it is possible!). However, after suggesting Bethany to use tiny*print's live chat, we were informed that the MSO option was only available as an addition to people who ordered cards, and the employees did not know of any places that
only printed envelopes. Lame! Educate yourselves if you're in the business. I admit, I have a love-hate relationship with that company.
By the way, I'm not talking about printing standard envelopes aka yucky business envelopes, but heavy-paper squareish colored envelopes (for special occasions).
After some more googling and yelping, there in fact are companies that print only envelopes, such as
Autumn Press and
Mercurio Brothers, both located in our very own Berzerk-eley. Sadly, these companies charge a crapload of money! Autumn Press goes at $1/envelope (excluding the price of the envelope)!!
And thus began our DIY envelope printing process. It came out to be a success!
Here are a few tips:1. Figure out the exact size and name of the envelopes you are using. We used A2 envelopes, which were 4 3/8 x 5 3/4".
2. Create a template for these envelopes, and after creating all the envelopes, turn it into a PDF file. Creating and editing this file can be done various ways (ex. Microsoft Word, Adobe InDesign). Because I dished out a ton of bank for an Adobe Creative Suite, I went ahead with Adobe InDesign. :) And besides, Adobe rocks my socks.
3. Use a top-feed printer. Bethany used her fiance's
Canon PIXMA 460 printer. You can't tell from the picture, but it is a top feed.
4. Test on regular paper before you hit the envelopes! This is crucial because it'll help you tweak the printing settings to make sure the envelopes print at the correct size.
5. Be mentally and emotionally ready to sacrifice a few of the actual envelopes for more test printing. This is when I had a taste of the roller coaster... The first few envelopes Bethany printed came out all smudged in one corner. What were the emotions? Defeat, disappointment, anguish... Fortunately, she tweaked some of the printer settings, and they later came out perfect! A glimmer of hope goes a long way! :)
6. Which brings me to my disclaimer point... every top-feed printer and computer is different. Be patient to play around with settings (google.com is an excellent tool) so that your envelopes turn out to be just as good as the professionals'!
Expect your invitations soon!