You have a bright and happy outlook as you enjoy the move to your new home and you want the whole world, including your postal carrier, to know how great your mood is. You’re getting new address stickers and they’re going to have a font that will be as yellow and cheery as the sun.

Unfortunately, those colorful stickers will not make everyone as happy as you. In fact, they may actually cause quite a bit of frustration, as people who saved them to remember your new address struggle to decipher the light print of the yellow font on a white background. As you choose the font color for your address stickers, you should:

• Preview the sticker design to see if it is hard to read. Black, brown, maroon or dark blue fonts are a good choice for backgrounds with a white or light color. A light font color on a very dark background is easier to read than a dark font.
• Consider using that font color that is difficult to read on just the first letter of a name instead of using it on the entire label. VistaPrint’s customization options make it simple to perform this design change.

You’ve never met a flourish you didn’t like, so as you look at all the options for address label designs Vistaprint.com has to offer, you are tempted to choose the most elaborate font you can find. After all, there are flourishes on every letter, so it has to be the perfect option, right? Actually, since it is fairly important that address labels are easy to read, you may want to avoid that fancy font. As you design your personalized return address labels, follow these tips for success:

• Choose a simple classic font, such as Ariel, Times New Roman, or Courier, for the actual address information. These fonts are used over and over by printers for good reason. They are very easy to read
• Don’t be as afraid to have fun with the font for your name. After all, as long as the address is easy to read, mail can still be returned to you if there is a problem. This is the spot for the curlicues and flourishes you adore.
• Be sure you use uppercase letters as you type the address in. While it is considered rude to type in all caps online, the postal service actually prefers uppercase letters because the automated machinery can read them more easily than a combination of uppercase and lowercase letters.

You wear designer shoes and only visit the trendiest boutiques, your purses are always this season’s must-haves, yet your checks are boring blue pieces of paper. You’ve decided that you can’t stand using those blah looking complimentary bank checks another minute and are looking for some fun and trendy options. VistaPrints designer checks fit the bill perfectly. If only you could tweak one of the designs a little to make the style truly yours. Actually, you can do just that with some of the different options available.

• Once you select the design you want, you can change the font of the name, address and phone number lines from the standard font to one that is elaborate, simple, or downright fun. This is also the time to decide whether you want your phone number printed on your checks.
• You accessorize your outfit each day, so why not accessorize your checks? You can enhance quite a few of the different styles with an accent image. If you like this option, you’ll need to look for a check design that says it is available with an accent image.
• There’s an additional line for a second name on your checks. If you don’t need that line, consider turning it into a space for a very short tagline, such as, “Shop Happy!”

 

You heard a heartbreaking story about a tragic loss because an unconscious parent couldn’t notify fire fighters that there was a child in the home, and it made you think about the safety of your children and pets. What if you weren’t home when the house caught fire? What if you were knocked out like the mom with the child who died in the fire? You need a way to make sure this never happens to the people and pets you love, but how?

The answer is actually quite simple. What you need is a sign that announces that there are pets or children inside.

• VistaPrint makes a window sign that says “Baby on Board” that can be ordered without any alterations and applied to a front window or to the glass of the front door.
• If you have several children or your baby insists he or she is not a baby anymore, take a look at some of the many child care designs. You can customize one of them with your message that your children may be inside.
• For your four-legged family members, there are several pet designs that can easily be altered to announce that there are two dogs and a cat inside in need of assistance.

If you have a small business, VistaPrint’s return address labels offer a very cheap and effective way for you to promote your business. To turn these inexpensive address labels into a marketing tool, you may want to:

• Design labels that promote your business website and email address. Apply them to product packaging so people remember where they bought the items they are using when they need to restock.
• Use labels to personalize generic treat bags. Put a few samples and some candy in them to give away when you set up a table to promote your business at local events.
• Create a set of labels that offer promotional messages. For example, you could make labels that have your business name on the first line and a message that says, Buy one, get one free, or Store special: 50% off, on the next line.
• Use labels to make a quick and easy reward program for frequent buyers. Give customers a business card or make a special reward card. Every time they make a purchase, stick a label on the card. When they collect a certain number of labels, allow them to redeem their cards for a percentage off the next purchase or for a small free item.

You’ve got your first real job and you want everyone to know. Well, everyone except your Cousin Freddie, who would just want to borrow some money. You’ve decided to use Vista Print to create announcements about your new job, but now you need a few pointers to help you get started. To make a new job announcement you can be proud of, try these suggestions:

• Choose announcements that have a similar new beginnings theme. Business announcements and graduation announcements are both easily altered to make an announcement about a new job. Use the advanced editing feature to tweak the layout or change colors to make the design suit your theme and style.
• Coordinate your announcements to match your business cards and include a business card complete with your new title in the announcement envelopes. This way, doting friends and family members can refer to the card to get the title right when they are bragging to that kid who bullied you in school about how well you are doing.
• Consider shopping for coordinating letterhead paper, return address labels and other professional stationary needs at the same time. This way, you won’t have to struggle to remember which fonts or colors you used when you need these supplies at a later date.

You’ve decided you want to mold young minds and help the under five age group develop skills that will help them succeed in school. As you start your daycare or preschool business, you decide you needed a cheap and effective way to let people know about the new childcare operation. You are going to use VistaPrint to create custom business cards. Now, you aren’t quite sure how to proceed. Didn’t you hear that business cards should be simple and elegant? Actually, a daycare or preschool is one business that usually doesn’t want a sophisticated card. To make business cards for your child care business, you should:

• Look for a design template that is colorful and fun. VistaPrint has quite a few designs that are perfect for a child care, including cards with colorful sunflower images or graphics that look like a child’s crayon drawings.
• Keep the card uncluttered. Putting only the essential information on the front of the card makes it easy for prospective clients to read and makes you look like the professional you are.
• Use the back of the card for information that is important, but doesn’t belong on the front. For example, if you want to pitch your child care’s terrific school readiness program, you can do so here.

You’ve decided you want to mold young minds and help the under five age group develop skills that will help them succeed in school. As you start your daycare or preschool business, you decide you needed a cheap and effective way to let people know about the new childcare operation. You are going to use VistaPrint to create custom business cards. Now, you aren’t quite sure how to proceed. Didn’t you hear that business cards should be simple and elegant? Actually, a daycare or preschool is one business that usually doesn’t want a sophisticated card. To make business cards for your child care business, you should:

• Look for a design template that is colorful and fun. VistaPrint has quite a few designs that are perfect for a child care, including cards with colorful sunflower images or graphics that look like a child’s crayon drawings.
• Keep the card uncluttered. Putting only the essential information on the front of the card makes it easy for prospective clients to read and makes you look like the professional you are.
• Use the back of the card for information that is important, but doesn’t belong on the front. For example, if you want to pitch your child care’s terrific school readiness program, you can do so here.

As you plan a big birthday party for your child, you are slightly horrified at the expense. The thought of the postage fees alone is making you downright nauseous. Then, a money saving idea occurs to you. Birthday postcards would be a great way to cut down on postage costs, because sending a postcard is a bit cheaper than mailing a letter. Now, you just hope VistaPrint offers birthday postcards!

A quick keyword search for birthday brings up several pages of colorful templates for birthday themed postcards, from monkeys to pirates. A few simple changes to make sure the cards will hold all the party information may be necessary if you opt for a design that isn’t already set up as an invitation, but it will be a pretty easy alteration.

Be sure you remember all of the important information an invitation should include, such as when and where the party will take place. Also, if the invitation doesnt make the party theme obvious, you should mention it on the invitation in case some of the guests want to come in costume. This is especially important for a princess party or pirate theme, since many children will seize any opportunity to put on their costumes.

For more information about postcards and Vistaprint, please see our Homepage - Vistaprint.co.uk.

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You’ve seen the bumper stickers sold by the local schools that say, “My child is an honor roll student at XYZ Academy,” and you are secretly a bit envious. To be perfectly frank, your child may never qualify for an honor roll bumper sticker. He’s an amazingly sweet and helpful kid and plays the tuba like an angel, but school work is a struggle. As you pull into the school parking lot with your squeaky clean minivan that is unmarred by bumper stickers, you notice that the cars on either side of you are so covered in stickers touting their straight “A” kids that you can’t actually tell what color the cars are! That’s it. You’re going straight home, hopping onto VistaPrint and seeing if you can find some kind of custom printing option for your car. Window decals? Perfect!

Window decals can be designed to say anything you want and are a great option for parents who are proud of their kids for things other than their grades. Why not design a decal that says, “My kid won the local track meet finals,” or, “My kid raised money for new playground equipment for ABC Park,” to celebrate how great your child is in other ways?

For more information about Window decals and Vistaprint, please see our Homepage - Vistaprint.co.uk.

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You like color. No, you love color. Your home has orange walls, brick red walls and even a few lemon yellow walls. Your business has purple and hot pink walls. People love all that color and you’ve decided to bring your vibrant palette to the online world. Your business website is not going to be like all those blue, gray and muted green websites everyone else has. You can’t wait for the customer compliments to begin.

You barely have the site up and running when the first call comes in. Unfortunately, instead of heaping praise, the customer tells you the site is hard to read. A second customer strolls in the door and tells you that while he loves the store, the colors on the site are so bright he actually developed a migraine. Wait a second. You used the same exact color shades on the site. What is going on here? There are several reasons your customers could be objecting to your bright hues:

• Different browsers interpret the same color differently. A nice pale yellow site may appear garishly yellow on one browser and greenish on another.
• Monitors are hard on our eyes when we read black text on a white background. Throwing hard to read colors into the mix increases eye strain.
• People simply have different tastes. What appeals to you may be unattractive to someone else. Since the customer is always right, it is better to have a business site with neutral colors.