I just ordered new business cards with my name, twitter ‘handle’ and website address as I often want to give these to people without the rest of my contact details.
I chose a company that advertises ‘budget-friendly’ cards – but had to pay double the minimum price to have them printed on recycled eco-friendly paper (100% post consumer waste & elemental chlorine free).
It took a while to find the page with the paper stock details but couldn’t find anything about the type of ink.
(For more about eco-friendly paper and printing, see my previous post on this topic: ‘Remember when recycled paper was easy to pick?‘)
It would have cost an extra $6 to get a ‘recycled’ logo on the back, so instead I added a note to the front of the card.
I wonder if anyone I meet will bother to read the small print?
I also wonder if I should have ordered a personalised shoulder bag as well? (Only if they are made from eco-friendly fabric by a socially responsible business, of course!) What do you think?!
(For more about eco-friendly and socially responsible garments, see my previous post on this topic: ‘The social cost of ‘affordable’ clothes‘.)
Unfortunately they were out of personalised mugs for my Fairtrade organic coffee.
(Images – business card artwork & customised bag via Vistaprint)
Categories: Waste, Workplaces
Sustainability soapbox 
Wow, the price of being eco-conscious. Sort of like the price of being healthy and looking for the whole-grain or low-sodium or sugar-free alternatives. But, the cards do look quite nice! And the shoulder bag, it would be easy to identify if you accidentally left it somewhere. 🙂
Low-salt & sugar-free business cards would no doubt have cost a lot more!
Good to have this all together. Btw Short print runs often digitally printed. No scale advantage after +100 cards. Offset/litho: higher min run but lower unit costs provided you can justify printing 1000! You prob know this though…
Good point about small print runs to minimise potential waste – especially for things like reports when you don’t know how many are needed or business cards when contact details change or you need to add new forms of social media!
Question is, how much did you pay?
Hi Levi
$10 for 250 ($20 for recycled paper); $16 for 500 ($32 for recycled). So still good prices (plus postage).
Cheers
Pip
Wow, that¹s super cheap. Who are you using?
Cheers
From: Sustainability soapbox Reply-To: Sustainability soapbox Date: Tuesday, 24 March 2015 10:23 PM To: Levi Gibson Subject: [New comment] Eco-friendly, but not necessarily budget-friendly, business cards
WordPress.com Pip Marks commented: “Hi Levi $10 for 250 ($20 for recycled paper); $17 for 500 ($34 for recycled). So still good prices (plus postage). Cheers Pip”
Vistaprint. You’re right. It’s still a lot cheaper than other companies I’ve used – as long as you are happy to use their design templates.
I just got the invoice & realised it was even less than I first thought. $16 for 500 not $17.
Great to hear from you!
Pip
Ah, so that is using one of their design templates. I thought it was too cheap. I currently pay almost $100 for 250.
So what do you get up to now Pip? What kind of consultancy work are you involved in?
Cheers
From: Sustainability soapbox Reply-To: Sustainability soapbox Date: Wednesday, 25 March 2015 9:38 AM To: Levi Gibson Subject: [New comment] Eco-friendly, but not necessarily budget-friendly, business cards
WordPress.com Pip Marks commented: “Vistaprint. You’re right. It’s still a lot cheaper than other companies I’ve used – as long as you are happy to use their design templates. I just got the invoice & realised it was even less than I first thought. $16 for 500 not $17. Great to hear fr”
I use Click Business Cards for my other business cards. I’ll send you an email to catch up.