"LookBooks" for our staff

[brandon]

Hey People,
Happy Friday. Not sure where to exactly post this as I can think of a few things, but I am just putting under the general section. This is probably really old to a few people on here but might be able to help others. It falls into the staging area for sure, and Tony has been posting amazing things about that. But this helps our shop a lot. We have several clients that we print for basically every week, if not every day. The old saying 10% of your clients gives you 90% of your business. And they need quick turn around - 500+ pieces, fronts and backs, tomorrow or yesterday? Sure, no problem. Situations like that. But for these clients while every PO gets the correct paperwork every time like all the others, they also have their own "LookBooks" if you will.  Type of blank, print order, screens, inks, all that. And every new design gets thrown in as well. And yes, this is all backed up digitally and then backed up again. But it makes it easy when the clients throws a multi thousand piece order at us with 20 or 30 designs and I just whip out the book and start scheduling press time and every thing else that goes along with it.

We are switching over to tablets soon (something I have been working on for months and months) and will be posting that this weekend. With pics as well. But I think these books will be something we will be doing for a long time to come. And when the client sees them it makes them feel all warm and special!

But below are two books for one client, about 150+ designs in there. Sorry I have to blur out, half of our clients we are not allowed to post anything online or show anybody anything. Makes updating our website and blog next to impossible since they do all the good stuff!!!

[3Deep]

We use to do something like that with our catalogs for sales, looking at this I might have to rethink about somethings, good idea.

Darryl

[tonypep]

Our Gravity Catalogs come out four times a year. We use an alpha numeric code when oredering designs. SC=Singlesided Childs design, MA=Multi sided Adult. EF =EmbroiderFlat, MMF=Mixed MediaFlat, etc. They are used both by the customers as well as internally. Also Art, Sales, Ink, and Production have DC notebooks to use when selecting discharge colors.
3.....this is a great idea. So often customers give their designs different names and #s and that can really muck thigs up. Its on a smaller scale of what Nike does. Every design and colorway has its own BOM (Bill of Materials) which painstakingly takes you through every minute detail of every garment.

[T Shirt Farmer]

Nice work there Brandon, visuals are so very important in what we all do. I am really looking forward to seeing about how the tablets are put to use improving your work flow

[ericheartsu]

so jealous of all this staging. Working on it this year, such a daunting task, for such a small shop

[brandon]

Thanks guys. And I have been to a Nike shop - very impressive! I think one of the most important things I forgot to mention is there is an actual printed sample attached to the back side of the previous page so while reading the details you have a real print right beside it. Can't tell how many times these books have saved us do to the clients fault regarding pantone color or the actual shirt color. And of course it would be OUR fault.....